\Jniv.  of  III.  Library 

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THE  JEWISH  CHURCH. 


LECTURES  ON  THE  HISTORY  OF  THE  EASTERN 
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HON.  GEO.  P.  MARSH'S  NEW  WORK. 

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THE  LIFE  OF  OUR  LORD  UPON  THE  EARTH 
considered  in  its  Historical,  Chronological,  and  Geographical 
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650  pages.  Price,  $2.25. 

LECTURES  ON  THE  SCIENCE  OF  LANGUAGE. 
By  Max  Muller,  M.  A.  From  the  second  revised  London 
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* 


3  Re  plia 

ishtervlj  / Vinurim  o 


no 


ARGOTS 


tig/Urtti- , 


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(ifra  r  ° 


■■■  A/nm 

-rtf/Jf/ifp-"'  .: 


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'/IH\\*'  '  I  >>•('. 


niiiirf  ''iimw"'' 


PALESTINE  UK  FORK  I’ 


(ONOUEST 


|  hi<i\\mborigmal  tribes  and  places  Black. 

Cana  twite  names  (proper) . 

Amonte ,  TRttite  dh  Penzzi te  names  Jird 
Ifivife  names  ........  Black, 

Nations  related  to  Israel  Blade. 


3 5  L  oTioitude  E ast  of  Greenwich  3 6 


Bhnri}  44#  ’Rvririflu/n  i  •  .  aC ' Yn-rlc 


^criEnapfi BroaJ^vj/  Jf.  Ydrh 


LECTURES 


ON  THE  HISTORY 

OF 

THE  JEWISH  CHURCH 


PART  I. 

ABRAHAM  to  SAMUEL 


BY  ARTHUR  PENRHYN  STANLEY,  D.  D. 

REGIUS  PROFESSOR  OP  ECCLESIASTICAL  HISTORY  IN  THE  UNIVERSITY  OF 
OXFORD,  AND  CANON  OF  CHRIST  CHURCH 


WITH  MAPS  AND  PLANS 


NEW  YORK 

CHARLES  SCRIBNER,  124  GRAND  STREET 

1864 


f Published  by  arrangement  with  the  Author  | 


RIVERSIDE,  CAMBRIDGE: 
STEREOTYPED  AND  PRINTED  BY  H.  0.  HOUGHTON 


M  1  S~ }  \  ei^ir 


SDelruatton. 

— ♦ — 

TO  THE  DEAR  MEMORY  OF  HER, 

BY  WHOSE  FIRM  FAITH,  CALM  WISDOM,  AND  TENDER  SYMPATHY, 
THESE  AND  ALL  OTHER  LABORS 
HAVE  FOR  YEARS  BEEN  SUSTAINED  AND  CHEERED, 

WHICH  SHARED  HER  LATEST  CARE, 

IS  NOW  DEDICATED, 

IN  SACRED  AND  EVERLASTING  REMEMBRANCE. 


d 

-N. 


‘ 


' 


*»  . 


•  ■ 


' 

}A  OJ 


Jv 


PREFACE. 


— -« - 

The  contents  of  this  volume,  in  accordance  with  a 
plan  which  I  have  set  forth  elsewhere,1  consist  of 
Lectures,  actually  or  in  substance,  addressed  to  my 
usual  hearers  at  Oxford,  chiefly  candidates  for  Holy 
Orders.  The  Twentieth  (with  some  slight  variations 
from  its  present  form)  was  preached  as  a  sermon  from 
the  University  Pulpit.  These  circumstances  will  ac¬ 
count  both  for  the  local  allusions,  and  for  the  practical 

* 

character  of  the  Lectures,  which  I  have  left  in  most 
cases  as  they  originally  stood. 

Throughout  the  volume  I  have  endeavored  to  bear 
in  mind  three  main  objects,  indicated  in  its  title. 

In  the  first  place,  the  work  must  be  regarded  not 
as  a  History,  but  as  Lectures.  This  mode  of  in¬ 
struction,  besides  being  that  to  which  I  was  naturally 
led  by  the  duties  of  my  Chair,  appeared  to  me  spe¬ 
cially  adapted  to  the  subjects  of  which  I  was  to  treat. 
In  the  case  of  a  history  so  familiar  as  that  of  which 
the  materials  are  for  the  most  part  contained  in  the 
Bible,  and  containing,  as  it  does,  topics  of  the  most 
varied  interest,  the  form  of  Lectures,  whilst  it  avoided 

1  Introductory  Lectures  to  the  History  of  the  Eastern  Church,  pp.  30-34. 


PREFACE. 


•  •  • 

Vlll 

the  necessity  of  a  continuous  narrative,  enabled  me 
to  select  the  portions  most  susceptible  of  fresh  illus¬ 
tration  and  combination,  and  at  the  same  time  most 
likely  to  stimulate  an  intelligent  study  of  the  whole. 
Moreover,  there  already  exists  in  English  a  well-known 
historical  narrative  of  the  History  of  the  Jews,  which 
is  now,  I  am  glad  to  hope,  on  the  point  of  reappearing, 
with  the  most  recent  revisions  from  the  pen  of  its 
distinguished  author.  I  trust  that  the  venerable  Dean 
of  S.  Paul’s  will  add  to  his  many  other  kindnesses 
his  forgiveness  of  this  intrusion  on  a  field  peculiarly 
his  own,  —  an  intrusion  which  would  never  have  been 
attempted,  but  in  the  belief  that  it  would  not  inter¬ 
fere  with  those  labors  which  have  made  his  name 
dear  to  all  who  know  the  value  of  a  genuine  love 
of  truth  and  freedom,  combined  with  profound  theo¬ 
logical  learning  and  high  ecclesiastical  station. 

Secondly,  although  for  the  above  reasons  abstaining 
from  the  attempt  to  write  a  consecutive  history,  I 
have  wished  to  present  the  main  characters  and  events 
of  the  Sacred  Narrative  in  a  form  as  nearly  historical 
as  the  facts  of  the  case  will  admit. 

The  Jewish  History  has  suffered  from  causes  similar 
to  those  which  still,  within  our  own  memory,  obscured 
the  history  of  Greece  and  of  Rome.  Till  within  the 
present  century,  the  characters  and  institutions  of 
those  two  great  countries  were  so  veiled  from  view  in 
the  conventional  haze  with  which  the  enchantment 
of  distance  had  invested  them,  that  when  the  more 
graphic  and  critical  historians  of  our  time  broke 


PREFACE. 


IX 


through  this  reserve,  a  kind  of  shock  was  felt  through 
all  the  educated  classes  of  the  country.  The  same 
change  was  in  a  still  higher  degree  needed  with  regard 
to  the  history  of  the  Jews.  Its  sacred  character  had 
deepened  the  difficulty  already  occasioned  by  its  ex¬ 
treme  antiquity.  That  earliest  of  Christian  heresies 
—  Docetism,  or  "phantom  worship”  —  the  reluctance 
to  recognize  in  sacred  subjects  their  identity  with  our 
own  flesh  and  blood  —  has  at  different  periods  of  the 
Christian  Church  affected  the  view  entertained  of  the 
whole  Bible.  The  same  tendency  which  led  Philo  and 
Origen,  Augustine  and  Gregory  the  Great,  to  see  in 
the  plainest  statements  of  the  Jewish  history  a  series 
of  mystical  allegories,  in  our  own  time  has  as  com¬ 
pletely  closed  its  real  contents  to  a  large  part  both 
of  religious  and  irreligious  readers,  as  if  it  had  been 
a  collection  of  fables.  Many,  who  would  be  scandal¬ 
ized  at  ignorance  of  the  battles  of  Salamis  or  Cannae, 
know  and  care  nothing  for  the  battles  of  Beth-horon 
and  Megiddo.  To  search  the  Jewish  records,  as  we 
would  search  those  of  other  nations,  is  regarded  as 
dangerous.  Even  to  speak  of  any  portion  of  the  Bible 
as  "a  history,”  has  been  described,  even  by  able  and 
pious  men,  as  an  outrage  upon  religion. 

In  protesting  against  this  elimination  of  the  histor¬ 
ical  element  from  the  Sacred  Narrative,  I  shall  not  be 
understood  as  wishing  to  efface  the  distinction  which 
good  taste,  no  less  than  reverence,  will  always  endeav¬ 
or  to  preserve  between  the  Jewish  and  other  histories. 
Even  in  dealing  with  Greek  and  Roman  times,  we 


X 


PREFACE. 


must  beware  of  an  excessive  reaction  against  the  old 
system  of  nomenclature.  An  indiscriminate  introduc¬ 
tion  of  modern  associations  into  the  ancient  or  the 
sacred  world  is  almost  as  misleading  as  their  entire 
exclusion.  But  we  shall  be  best  preserved  from  such 
dangers  by  a  true  understanding  of  the  actual  events, 
persons,  and  countries  of  which  we  profess  to  speak. 
And  there  are  so  many  signs  of  returning  healthiness 
in  regard  to  Biblical  History,  that  we  need  not  fear 
for  the  result.  It  is  one  of  the  many  debts  of  grat¬ 
itude  which  the  Church  of  England  owes  to  the 
author  of  the  u  Christian  Year,”  that  he  was  one  of 
the  first  amongst  our  divines  who  ventured  in  his 
well-known  poems  to  allude  to  the  scenes  and  the 
characters  of  the  Sacred  Story  in  the  same  terms 
that  he  would  have  used  if  speaking  of  any  other 
remarkable  history.  It  is  for  this  reason,  amongst 
others,  that  I  have  on  all  occasions,  where  it  was  pos¬ 
sible,  employed  his  language  —  now  happily  familiar 
to  the  whole  of  English  Christendom  —  to  enforce  and 
to  illustrate  my  own  descriptions.  Similar  examples 
of  freely  handling  these  sacred  subjects  in  a  becoming 
spirit  may  be  seen  (to  select  two  works,  widely  dif¬ 
fering  in  other  respects)  in  Dr.  Robinson’s  “  Biblical 
“  Researches  in  Palestine,”  and  the  Prefaces  to  Dr.  Pu- 
sey’s  “  Commentary  on  the  Minor  Prophets.”  Indeed 
it  may  safely  be  said,  —  and  it  is  the  almost  inevitable 
result  of  an  intimate  acquaintance  with  the  language, 
the  topography,  or  the  poetry  of  the  Bible,  —  that 
whoever  has  passed  through  any  one  of  these  gates 


i 


PREFACE. 


XI 


into  a  nearer  presence  of  the  truths  and  the  events 
described  will  never  again  be  able  to  speak  of  them 
with  the  cold  and  stiff  formality  which  once  was 
thought  their  only  safeguard. 

Thirdly,  it  has  been  my  intention  to  make  these 
Lectures  strictly  “ ecclesiastical”  The  history  of  the 
J ewish  race,  language,  and  antiquities  belongs  to  other 
departments.  It  is  the  history  of  the  Jewish  Church 
of  which  my  office  invited  me  to  speak.  I  have  thus 
been  led  to  dwell  especially  on  those  parts  of  the 
history  which  bear  directly  on  the  religious  develop¬ 
ment  of  the  nation.  I  have  never  forgotten  that  the 
literature  of  the  Hebrew  race,  from  which  the  mate¬ 
rials  of  these  Lectures  are  drawn,  is  also  the  Bible,  — 
the  Sacred  Book,  or  Books,  of  Christendom.  I  have 
constantly  endeavored  to  remind  my  hearers  and 
readers  that  the  Christian  Church  sprang  out  of  the 
Jewish,  and  therefore  to  connect  the  history  of  the 
two  together,  both  by  way  of  contrast  and  illustrar 
tion,  wherever  opportunity  offered.  Whatever  me¬ 
morials  of  any  particular  form  or  epoch  of  the  Jew¬ 
ish  History  can  be  permanently  traced  in  the  institu¬ 
tions,  the  language,  the  imagery,  of  either  Church,  I 
have  endeavored  carefully  to  note.  The  desire  to 
find  in  all  parts  of  the  Old  Testament  allegories  or 
types  of  the  New,  has  been  pushed  to  such  an  excess 
that  many  students  turn  away  from  this  side  of  the 
history  in  disgust.  But  there  is  a  continuity  of  char¬ 
acter  running  through  the  career  of  the  Chosen  Peo- 
pie  which  cannot  be  disputed,  and  on  this,  the  true 


Xii  PREFACE. 

historical  basis  of  “  types”  —  which  is,  in  fact,  only 
the  Greek  word  for  “likenesses,”  —  I  have  not  scru¬ 
pled  to  dwell.  Throughout  I  have  sought  to  recog¬ 
nize  the  identity  of  purpose  —  the  constant  gravita¬ 
tion  towards  the  greatest  of  all  events  —  which,  un¬ 
der  any  hypothesis,  must  furnish  the  main  interest  of 
the  History  of  Israel. 

These  are  the  chief  points  to  which  I  have  called 
attention  in  my  Lectures,  and  to  which  I  here  again 
call  the  attention  of  my  readers.  There  are  many 
collateral  questions  naturally  arising  out  of  the  sub¬ 
ject,  for  which  the  purpose  of  this  work  furnishes  no 
scope.  Discussions  of  chronology,  statistics,  and  phys¬ 
ical  science,  —  of  the  critical  state  of  the  different 
texts  and  the  authorship  of  the  different  portions  of 
the  narration,  —  of  the  precise  limits  to  be  drawn  be¬ 
tween  natural  and  supernatural,1  providential  and 
miraculous,  —  unless  in  passages  where  the  existing 
documents  and  the  existing  localities  force  the  con¬ 
sideration  upon  us,  —  I  have  usually  left  unnoticed.  I 
have  passed  by  these  questions,  because  I  do  not 
wish  to  disturb  my  readers  with  distinctions  which  to 
the  Sacred  writers  were  for  the  most  part  alien  and 
unknown,  and  which,  within  the  limits  of  the  plan  of 
this  work,  would  be  superfluous  and  inappropriate. 
The  only  exception  which  I  have  made  has  been  in 
favor  of  illustrations  from  Geography.  These,  from 


1  For  an  able  statement  of  this  tide  on  “the  Supernatural ”  in  the 
question  I  venture  to  refer  to  an  ar-  Edinburgh  Review ,  No.  236,  p.  378. 


PREFACE. 


xiii 


the  circumstance  of  my  haying  been  twice  enabled  to 
visit  the  scenes  of  Sacred  History,  I  felt  that  I  might 
be  pardoned  for  offering  as  my  special  contribution 
to  the  study  of  the  subject,  even  if  they  somewhat 
exceeded  the  due  proportion  of  the  rest  of  the  work.1 
On  all  other  matters  of  this  secondary  nature,  I  have 
been  content  to  rest  on  the  researches2  of  others,  and 
to  refer  to  them  for  further  elucidation.  No  one  will, 
I  trust,  suspect  me  of  undervaluing  these  researches. 
It  is  my  firm  conviction  that  in  proportion  as  such 
inquiries  are  fearlessly  pursued  by  those  who  are  able 
to  make  them,  will  be  the  gain  both  to  the  cause  of 
Biblical  science  and  of  true  Religion ;  and  I,  for  one, 
must  profess  my  deep  obligations  to  those  who,  in 
other  countries,  have  devoted  their  time  and  labor, 
and  in  this  country  have  hazarded  worldly  interests 
and  popular  favor,  in  this  noble,  though  often  peril¬ 
ous,  pursuit  of  Divine  Truth. 

To  name  any,  in  a  field  where  so  many  have  con¬ 
tributed  to  the  general  result,  would  be  difficult  and 
invidious.  But  there  is  one  so  distinguished  above  the 
rest,  and  so  closely  connected  with  the  subject  of  this 
work,  that  I  must  be  permitted  to  express  here,  once 


1  This  must  be  my  excuse  for  the 
frequent  references  to  another  work, 
Sinai  and  Palestine,  which  was  origi¬ 
nally  undertaken  with  the  express  pur¬ 
pose  of  a  preparation  for  such  a  work 
as  is  here  attempted.  I  have  also 
ventured  to  take  this  opportunity  of 
giving  in  the  Appendix  an  account  of 
the  two  most  remarkable  scenes,  which 
I  witnessed  in  my  late  journey  to  the 
Holy  Land, —  the  visit  to  the  Mosque  of 


Hebron,  and  the  Samaritan  Pass- 
over. 

2  It  will  be  seen  that  there  is  one 
name  constantly  recurring  here,  as  in 
all  else  that  I  have  written  on  these 
subjects.  It  is  an  unfailing  pleasure 
to  me  to  refer  to  Mr.  Grove’s  con¬ 
tinued  aid  —  such  as  I  could  have  re¬ 
ceived  from  no  one  else  in  like  degree 
—  in  all  questions  connected  with  Sa¬ 
cred  history  and  geography. 


XIV 


PREFACE. 


for  all,  the  gratitude  which  I,  in  common  with  many 
others,  owe  to  his  vast  labors. 

It  is  now  twenty-five  years  ago  since  Arnold  wrote 
to  Bunsen,1  "What  Wolf  and  Niebuhr  have  done  for 
"  Greece  and  Rome,  seems  sadly  wanted  for  Judaea.” 
The  wish  thus  boldly  expressed  for  a  critical  and  his¬ 
torical  investigation  of  the  Jewish  history  was,  in  fact, 
already  on  the  eve  of  accomplishment.  At  that  time 
Ewald  was  only  known  as  one  of  the  chief  Orientalists 
of  Germany.  He  had  not  yet  proved  himself  to  be 
the  first  Biblical  scholar  in  Europe.  But,  year  by  year, 
he  was  advancing  towards  his  grand  object.  To  his 
profound  knowledge  of  the  Hebrew  language  he  added, 
step  by  step,  a  knowledge  of  each  stage  of  the  Hebrew 
Literature.  These  labors  on  the  prophetic  and  poetic 
books  of  the  ancient  Scriptures  culminated  in  his  no¬ 
ble  work  on  the  History  of  the  People  of  Israel  —  as 
powerful  in  its  general  conception,  as  it  is  saturated 
with  learning  down  to  its  minutest  details.  It  would 
be  presumptuous  in  me  either  to  defend  or  to  attack 
the  critical  analysis,  which  to  most  English  readers 
savors  of  arbitrary  dogmatism,  with  which  he  assigns 
special  dates  and  authors  to  the  manifold  constituent 
parts  of  the  several  books  of  the  Old  Testament ;  and 
from  many  of  his  general  statements  I  should  venture 
to  express  my  disagreement,  were  this  the  place  to  do 
so.  But  the  intimate  acquaintance  which  he  exhibits 
with  every  portion  of  the  Sacred  Writings,  combined 
as  it  is  with  a  loving  and  reverential  appreciation  of 


1  Arnold’s  Letters ,  Feb.  10, 1835  {Life  and  Correspondence ,  i.  338). 


PREFACE. 


XV 


each  individual  character,  and  of  the  whole  spirit  and 
purpose  of  the  Israelitish  history,  has  won  the  respect 
even  of  those  who  differ  widely  from  his  conclusions. 
How  vast  its  silent  effect  has  been  may  be  seen  from 
the  recognition  of  its  value,  not  only  in  its  author’s 
own  country,  but  in  France  and  in  England  also.  One 
instance  may  suffice :  —  the  constant  reference  to  his 
writings  throughout  the  new  “  Dictionary  of  the  Bible,” 
to  which  I  have  myself  so  often  referred  with  advan¬ 
tage,  and  which  more  than  any  other  single  English 
work  is  intended  to  represent  the  knowledge  and 
meet  the  wants  of  the  rising  generation  of  Biblical 
students. 

But,  in  fact,  my  aim  has  been  not  to  recommend 
the  teaching  or  the  researches  of  any  theologian  how¬ 
ever  eminent,  but  to  point  the  way  to  the  treasures 
themselves  of  that  History  on  which  I  have  spent  so 
many  years  of  anxious,  yet  delightful,  labor.  There 
are  some  excellent  men  who  disparage  the  Old  Tes¬ 
tament,  as  the  best  means  of  saving  the  New.  There 
are  others  who  think  that  it  can  only  be  maintained 
by  discouraging  all  inquiry  into  its  authority  or  its 
contents.  It  is  true  that  the  Old  Testament  is  inferior 
to  the  New,  that  it  contains  and  sanctions  many  in¬ 
stitutions  and  precepts  (polygamy,  for  example,  and 
slavery),  which  have  been  condemned  or  abandoned 
by  the  tacit  consent  of  nearly  the  whole  of  Christen¬ 
dom.  But  this  inferiority  is  no  more  than  both 
Testaments  freely  recognize  ;  the  one  by  pointing  to 
a  Future  greater  than  itself,  the  other  by  insisting  on 


XVI 


PREFACE. 


the  gradual,  partial,  imperfect  character  of  the  Beve- 
lations  that  had  preceded  it.  It  is  true  also  that  the 
rigid  acceptance  of  every  part  of  the  Old  Testament, 
as  of  equal  authority,  equal  value,  and  equal  accuracy, 
is  rendered  impossible  by  every  advance  made  in  Bib¬ 
lical  science,  and  by  every  increase  of  our  acquaintance 
with  Eastern  customs  and  primeval  history.  But  it  is 
no  less  true  that  by  almost  every  one  of  these  ad¬ 
vances  the  beauty  and  the  grandeur  of  the  substance 
and  spirit  of  its  different  parts  are  enhanced  to  a  de¬ 
gree  far  transcending  all  that  was  possible  in  former 
ages. 

My  object  will  have  been  attained,  if,  by  calling  at¬ 
tention  to  these  incontestable  and  essential  features 
of  the  Sacred  History,  I  may  have  been  able  in  any 
measure  to  smooth  the  approaches  to  some  of  the 
theological  difficulties  which  may  be  in  store  for  this 
generation;  still  more  if  I  can  persuade  any  one  to 
look  on  the  History  of  the  Jewish  Church  as  it  really 
is;  to  see  how  important  is  the  place  which  it  occu¬ 
pies  in  the  general  education  of  the  world,  —  how 
many  elements  of  religious  thought  it  supplies,  wdiich 
even  the  New  Testament  fails  to  furnish  in  the  same 
degree,  —  how  largely  indebted  to  it  have  been  already, 
and  may  yet  be,  in  a  still  greater  degree,  the  Civil¬ 
ization  and  the  Faith  of  mankind. 


Christ  Church,  Oxford: 
Sept.  16,  1862. 


TABLE  OF  CONTENTS 


PAGE 

Preface . vii 

Introduction . xxix 

Three  Stages  of  the  History  of  the  Jewish  Church  .  .  xxix,  xxx 

Authorities  for  the  History  ........  xxx 

1.  Comparison  of  the  different  Canonical  Books  .  .  .  xxxi 

2.  Lost  Books  .........  xxxii 

3.  The  Hebrew  Text.  —  The  Septuagint .  .  .  xxxiii,  xxxiv 

4.  Traditions  of  the  East.  —  Josephus  ....  xxxv,  xxxvi 


THE  PATRIARCHS. 

— ♦ — 

LECTURE  I. 

THE  CALL  OF  ABRAHAM. 

The  beginning  of  Ecclesiastical  History . 3 

I.  The  Migration  of  Abraham  .......  5 

Ur  of  the  Chaldees.  —  Orfa.  —  Haran.  —  Passage  of  the 

Euphrates. — Damascus . 5-10 

Likeness  to  the  Arabian  Chiefs  .  .  .  .  .  11 

II.  The  Call  of  Abraham  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .14 

1.  “  The  Friend  of  God.” —  The  Worship  of  the  Heavenly 

Bodies  and  of  the  Kings.  —  Abraham  the  first  Teacher 
of  the  Divine  Unity  .......  14-18 

2.  “The  Father  of  the  Faithful:” . 20 

Faith  of  Abraham  ......  20 

His  universal  Character  ....  21-24 

The  name  of  Elohim  .....  24 

The  Covenant.  —  Circumcision.  —  The  Father  of 
the  Jewish  Church  .....  26-28 


xvm 


TABLE  OF  CONTENTS. 


LECTURE  II. 

ABRAHAM  AND  ISAAC. 

PAG1 

The  First  Entrance  into  the  Holy  Land . 29 

I.  The  Halting-places  of  Abraham: 

1.  Shechem.  —  2.  Bethel.  —  3.  The  Oak  of  Mamre.  —  The 

Cave  of  Machpelah. — 4.  Beersheba  .  .  .  31-38 

II.  Simplicity  of  the  Patriarchal  Age  : 

Ishmael.  —  Isaac.  —  Rebekah . 40-42 

III.  External  Relations  of  Abraham . .  .  42 

1.  To  the  Canaanites . 43 

2.  To  Egypt . 44 

3.  To  Chedorlaomer . 46 

Melchizedek . .  48 

4.  To  the  Cities  of  the  Plain . 50 

IV.  Sacrifice  of  Isaac . ,  51-56 


LECTURE  in. 

JACOB. 

Contrast  of  Abraham  and  Jacob . 57 

I.  Characters  of  Jacob  and  Esau . 58 

Esau  the  likeness  of  the  Edomites, —  Jacob,  of  the  Jews  60,  61 
Examples  of  mixed  Characters  .  .  .  .  .  .61 

II.  Wanderings  of  Jacob  .........  63 

1.  Jacob  at  Bethel . 63 

2.  In  Mesopotamia . 66 

3.  At  Gilead  . . 68 

4.  At  Mahanaim . 69 

5.  At  Peniel . 71 

Retirement  of  Esau . 73 

The  Book  of  Job . 74 

6.  Jacob’s  Settlement  at  Shechem . 75 

The  Oak  of  Deborah . 78 

The  Grave  of  Rachel  ......  78 

7.  The  Stay  at  Hebron . 79 

8.  The  Descent  into  Egypt  ......  80 

The  Death  of  Jacob . 81 


LECTURE  IV. 

ISRAEL  IN  EGYPT. 

I.  Joseph  in  Egypt . 84-89 

II.  Israel  in  Egypt . 89 

The  Shepherd  Kings  and  pastoral  state  of  Israel .  .  .91 

The  Servitude . 92 


TABLE  OF  CONTENTS. 


XIX 


III.  Effects  of  their  Stay :  pags 

1.  Heliopolis,  and  Worship  of  the  Sun . 94 

2.  Idolatry  of  Kings.  —  Raineses . 99,100 


Pharaoh . 101 

3.  Leprosy  .........  104 

4.  The  Use  of  the  Ass . 104 


Points  of  Contact  and  Contrast  in  the  Religions  of  Egypt  and  Israel  106-108 


MOSES. 


LECTURE  V. 

THE  EXODUS. 

Strabo’s  Account  of  Moses . 114 

I.  The  Birth  of  Moses  .........  116 

His  Education . 116 

His  Escape . 119 

H.  The  Call  of  Moses.  —  The  Burning  Bush.  —  The  Shepherd’s 

Staff . 120-122 

The  name  of  Jehovah  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  122 

The  Return  of  Moses  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .125 

His  personal  Appearance  and  Character  .  .  .  .  125 

His  Family . 128 

HI.  The  Deliverance . 129 

The  Plagues . 130 

The  Exodus . 132 

The  Passover . 133 

The  Flight  .........  137 

Rameses.  —  Succoth.  —  Etham.  —  Passage  of  the  Red  Sea  138-14 1 

Its  peculiar  Characteristics . 142-144 

The  Song  of  Miriam . 146 


LECTURE  VI. 

THE  WILDERNESS. 


The  Importance  of  Moses . 149, 150 

Uncertainties  of  the  Topography  of  the  Wanderings  .  .  .  151 

Importance  of  the  Stay  in  the  Wilderness  to  Christian  and  to  Jewish 

History:  Its  Peculiarities  .......  152-154 

Battle  of  Rephidim  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  157 

The  Kenites. — Jethro  ......  158,159 

The  Difficulties  of  the  Desert.  —  Water.  —  Manna  .  160-162 


XX 


TABLE  OF  CONTENTS. 


LECTURE  VII. 

SINAI  AND  THE  LAW. 

PAGB 

March  from  Rephidim .  .  .  165 

Sinai . 165 

I.  Negative  Revelation .  .  .168 

II.  Positive  Revelation  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  169 

Prophetic  Mission  of  Moses . 171 

Absence  of  the  Revelation  of  a  Future  Life  .  .  .  173 

The  Theocracy . 174 

III.  The  Law  ...........  179 

Traces  of  the  Desert : 

1.  Constitution  of  the  Tribes . 181 

2.  The  Encampment . 182 

The  Ark . 183 

The  Tabernacle . 185 

3.  Sacrifice.  —  The  Tribe  of  Levi . 186-188 

4.  Distinctions  of  Food  .......  189 

5.  Blood  Revenge . 191 

6.  The  Law  generally  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  192 

The  Ten  Commandments . 194 


LECTURE  VIII. 

KADESH  AND  PISGAH. 

I.  Journey  from  Sinai  to  Kadesh . 199 

Relics  of  the  Time . 200 

Kadesh . 202 

Death  of  Aaron  and  Miriam . 203 

Moses  and  El  Khudr . 205 

II.  Journey  from  Kadesh  to  Moab . 206 

Passage  of  the  Zered . 207 

Passage  of  the  Arnon . 207 

The  Well  of  the  Heroes . 207 

The  Last  Days  of  Moses.  —  Pisgah . 209 

1.  Balaam.  —  His  Character . 209 

His  Journey . 212 

His  Vision  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .215 

2.  Farewell  of  Moses.  —  Deuteronomy.  —  The  Two  Songs. — 

“  The  Prayer  of  Moses,  the  Man  of  God”  .  .  218-220 

The  last  View  from  Pisgah . 220 

The  End  of  Moses . 223 


TABLE  OF  CONTENTS. 


XXI 


THE  CONQUEST  OF  PALESTINE. 

— ♦ — 

LECTURE  IX. 

THE  CONQUEST  OF  THE  EAST  OF  THE  JORDAN. 

PAGS 

The  Early  Inhabitants  of  Western  Palestine  .  .  .  .  .230 

The  Phoenicians  or  Canaanites  ........  232 

Conquest  of  Eastern  Palestine . 234 

Sihon,  King  of  Heshbon.  —  Battle  of  Jahaz. — Defeat  of 

Midian .  235-237 

Og,  King  of  Bashan.  —  Battle  of  Edrei.  —  Settlement  of  Ba- 

shan.  —  Jair. — Nobah .  237-240 

Pastoral  Character  of  the  Settlement . 241 

Reuben  ...........  242 

Gad.  —  Manasseh .  242,  243 

Controversy  between  the  Eastern  and  Western  Tribes  .  .  .  244 

Legend  of  Nobah  ..........  245 

Eastern  Palestine  the  Refuge  of  the  West  .  .  .  .  .  .247 


LECTURE  X. 

THE  CONQUEST  OF  WESTERN  PALESTINE  —  THE  FALL  OF  JERICHO. 

Importance  of  Western  Palestine . 249 

Phinehas  ............  250 

Joshua . 251 

His  Character.  —  His  Name .  252-254 

The  Passage  of  the  Jordan .  255-257 

Gilgal  ...........  258 

Jericho  259 

Its  Fall . 261 

Fall  of  Ai  .  .  . . 263 

Rahab .  263 

The  Gibeonites . 264 


LECTURE  XI. 

THE  BATTLE  OF  BETH-HORON. 

Siege  of  Gibeon . 267 

Battle  of  Beth- horon.  —  First  Stage  ......  268 

Second  Stage  ..........  268 

Joshua’s  Prayer . 269 


XXII 


TABLE  OF  CONTENTS. 


PAOB 

Third  Stage.  —  The  Slaughter  of  the  Kings  at  Makkedah  .  .  271 

Difficulties  of  the  Story  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  274 

1.  The  Sun  standing  still. —  Answer  of  Galileo  and  of  Kepler  274-277 

2.  The  Massacre  of  the  Canaanites.  —  Answer  of  Chrysostom. 

—  Answer  of  our  Lord.  —  Answer  of  the  Epistle  to  the 

Hebrews .  278-280 

Illustrations .  280, 281 

The  Moral  Lesson  .  .  - .  282-285 


LECTURE  XII. 

THE  BATTLE  OF  MEROM  AND  SETTLEMENT  OF  THE  TRIBES. 

I.  Hazor  ............  286 

Gathering  of  the  Kings  ......  .  .  287 

The  Battle  of  Merom  ........  288 

II.  Settlement  of  the  Tribes : 

1.  Separate  Conquests . 290 

Jair  and  Nobah.  —  Dan.  —  Attack  on  Bethel.  —  Judah. 

—  Caleb  and  Hebron. —  Othniel  and  Debir  .  290-293 

2.  Assignment  of  Land  : 

Ephraim  .........  294 

Benjamin  .........  295 

Simeon  .........  296 

Zebulun,  Issachar,  Asher,  Naphtali  .  .  .  .297 

Dan . 297 

Levi . 298 

III.  Effects  of  the  Conquest  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  299 

1.  Settlement  of  the  Nation  ......  299 

*  2.  Contact  with  Canaanites  ......  301 

3.  Occupation  of  the  Holy  Land  .....  302 

4.  Laws  of  Property.  —  Decrees  of  Joshua  .  .  302,  303 

IV.  Remains  of  the  conquered  Races  .......  304 

Unconquered  Fortresses  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  305,306 

Tributary  Towns  .  307 

Migration . 307 

V.  Capitals . 308 

Shiloh  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  308 

Shechem  . . 309 

Joshua’s  Grave . *  e  310-312 


TABLE  OF  CONTENTS. 


XXlll 


THE  JUDGES. 

— « — 

LECTURE  XIII. 

ISRAEL  UNDER  THE  JUDGES. 

PAG '5 

Characteristics  of  the  Period . 315 

I.  Outward  Struggles . 317 

Continuation  of  the  Conquest  —  Military  Discipline  .  .  318-320 

II.  Internal  Disorder  .........  321 

Office  of  Judge . 322 

III.  Phoenician  Influences . 323 

The  Name  of  Baal . *  324 

Worship  of  Baal  Beritli  .  .......  324 

Vows  ............  325 

IV.  Primitive  Simplicity  . . 325 

1.  The  Danites  and  Micah  .......  327 

2.  The  War  with  Benjamin  . . 333 

3.  Ruth  ..........  336 

V.  Mixed  Characters  .  .  .......  338 

Classical  Element  * . 341 

VI.  Analogy  to  the  Middle  Ages .  343-347 


LECTURE  XIV. 

DEBORAH. 

i 

Preliminary  Conflicts.  —  Othniel . 348 

Ehud . 348 

Deborah . 350 

Jabin  of  Hazor . 351 

Barak  .............  353 

Gathering  of  the  Tribes . 354 

The  Meeting  on  Tabor  .........  355 

Encampment  at  Taanach . 357 

Battle  of  Megiddo . .  .  .358 

The  Murder  of  Sisera . 862 

Effect  of  the  Battle . *  .  .  .364 

The  Blessing  on  Jael . 365 

The  Song  of  Deborah . 370 


XX1Y 


TABLE  OE  CONTENTS. 


LECTURE  XY. 

GIDEON. 

FAGS 

The  Midianites  .  .  .  . . 374 

Gideon . 375 

The  Massacre  on  Tabor . 376 

The  Mission  of  Gideon  .  .  . . 377 

1.  The  Overthrow  of  the  Worship  of  Baal  .  .  .  .378 

2.  The  Insurrection  against  Midian . 379 

The  Battle  of  Jezreel . .379 

The  Battle  of  the  Rock  of  Oreb  ......  381 

The  Battle  of  Karkor . 382 

Royal  State  of  Gideon  .  . . 384 

Rise  of  Abimelech . .  .  .  .  .385 

Parable  of  Jotham  ..........  386 

Internal  State  of  Shechem  . . 389 

Eall  of  Abimelech  ..........  390 


LECTURE  XYI. 

JEPHTHAH  AND  SAMSON. 

Jephthah.  Transjordanic  character  of  his  History.  —  Shibboleth 

Sacrifice  of  his  Daughter  .......  393-399 

Samson.  The  Philistines  ........  400 

Birth  of  Samson . 403 

The  First  Xazarite  .........  403 

His  Humor  . . 405 

His  Philistine  Conquests . 406 

“  Samson  Agonistes  ” . 412 


LECTURE  XYII. 

THE  FALL  OF  SHILOH.  ' 

The  Rise  of  Eli  . . 414 

Shiloh  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  416 

Elkanah  and  Hannah . 417 

Hophni  and  Phinehas . .  .  .  418 

Doom  of  the  House  of  Ithamar . .  .419 

Battle  of  Aphek . 420 

Capture  of  the  Ark . 422 

Fall  of  the  Sanctuary  of  Shiloh . 424 


TABLE  OF  CONTENTS. 


XXV 


SAMUEL  AND  THE  PROPHETICAL  OFFICE. 

— ♦ — 

LECTURE  XVIII 

SAMUEL. 

PAGE 

Close  of  the  Theocracy . 429 

Beginning  of  the  Monarchy . 430 

Transition . .  .  .431 

Rise  of  Samuel . 432 

I.  His  connection  with  the  Past . 432 

\ 

The  Last  of  the  Judges . 433 

The  Battle  of  Ebenezer . 434 

His  Oracular  .Fame . 435 

His  Prayer  of  Intercession . 436 

His  Outward  Appearance . 437 

H.  The  First  of  the  Order  of  Prophets . 437 

His  “  Revelations  ” . 438 

“  Samuel  the  Seer” . 439 

The  Schools  of  the  Prophets . 440 

The  Prophetic  Mission  of  Samuel . 443 

His  Mediation  between  the  Old  and  the  New  ....  444 

His  Independence . 447 

His  Anti-sacerdotal  Character  . . 448 

His  Gradual  Growth .  449-451 

His  End . 453 

His  Grave . 453 

The  Lesson  of  Samuel’s  Life .  454-456 


LECTURE  XIX. 

* 

THE  HISTORY  OF  THE  PROPHETICAL  ORDER. 

I.  The  Meaning  of  the  word  Prophet .  457-459 

II.  The  Office  ..........  461 

Amongst  Heathens  . . 463 

In  the  Jewish  Church . 463 

1.  The  Age  of  Moses  .  .  . 464 

2.  The  Judges.  —  Samuel . 465 

3.  David  and  Nathan . 466 

4.  Prophets  of  the  Kingdom  of  Israel  .  .  .  .  467 

5.  Prophets  of  the  Kingdom  of  Judah . 468 

6.  Prophets  of  the  Captivity  and  the  Return  .  .  470,471 

d 


XXVI 


TABLE  OE  CONTENTS. 


PAOl 

7.  Prophets  of  the  Christian  Era : 

John  the  Baptist . 472 

The  Christ . 472 

The  Apostles . .  472 

1H.  Characteristics  of  the  Institution . 473 

1.  The  Prophetic  Call  473 

2.  Absence  of  Consecration  . . .475 

3.  Universality  of  Selection  ......  475 

4  Schools  of  the  Prophets  .  477 

5.  Modes  of  Prophetic  Teaching.  —  Poetry  .  .  .  478 

Apologues  .  .  . . 480 

Oral  . . 481 

6.  Community  of  Prophetic  Literature  .  .  .  .  .482 

Summary  of  the  Office.  —  Its  Functions  in  the  State  and  Church 

of  Palestine .  483-487 

Note . 488 

Catalogue  of  the  Prophets : 

I.  In  the  Jewish  Canon  ......  488 

II.  In  Rabbinical  Traditions  ......  488 

III.  In  Mussulman  Traditions  ....  488,  489 

IV.  In  Ecclesiastical  Traditions . 489 


LECTURE  XX. 

ON  THE  NATURE  OF  THE  PROPHETIC  TEACHING. 

Importance  of  the  Prophetic  Teaching . 491 

I.  In  Relation  to  the  Past: 

The  Historical  Works  of  the  Prophets . 493 

II.  In  Relation  to  the  Present : 

1.  Their  Theology : 

The  Unity  and  the  Spirituality  of  God  ....  495 


2.  Their  Exaltation  of  the  Moral  above  the  Positive  Law  .  496 

3.  Their  position  as  Counsellors . 502 

4.  Their  Political  Functions . 506 

5.  Their  Independence . 509 

III.  In  Relation  to  the  Future . 511 

Their  Predictions  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .514 

1.  Political  and  Secular  Predictions . 514 

2.  Messianic  Predictions . 519 

3.  Predictions  of  the  Future  of  the  Church,  of  the  Future  of 

the  Individual  Soul,  and  of  the  Future  Life  .  .  521 


TABLE  OF  CONTENTS. 


XXY11 


APPENDIX  I. 

TRADITIONAL  LOCALITIES  OF  ABRAHAM’S  MIGRATION. 

PACK 


I.  Ur  of  the  Chaldees . 527 

1.  Kalah-Sherkat . 527 

2.  Warka . 527 

3.  Mugheyer  .  527 

4.  Orfa . 528 

II.  Haran . 528 

1.  Haran  in  Mesopotamia . 528 

2.  Harran-el-Awamid ,  near  Damascus  .  .  .  .  529 

IH.  “  The  Place,”  or  “  Mosque,  of  Abraham,”  near  Damascus  .  .532 


APPENDIX  H. 

THE  CAVE  OF  MACHPELAH. 


History  of  the  Cave . 535 

Visit  of  the  Prince  of  Wales .  .  540 


APPENDIX  III. 

,  %  ^  „  ;  ’  , 

The  Samaritan  Passover . 55D 


Note.  The  Arithmetical  Errors  in  the  Pentateuch  •  .  .  .567 


Index 


569 


LIST  OF  MAPS  AND  PLANS. 


♦ 


Map  of  the  Migrations  of  Abraham 

“  Palestine  before  the  Conquest  . 
Sketch  Plan  of  the  Mosque  at  Hebron  • 
Plan  of  Mount  Gerizim  ...  * 


.  to  face  page  5 

.  “  “  231 

.  “  “  543 

,  .  .  page  557 


INTRODUCTION. 


- • - 

The  History  of  the  Jewish  Church  is  divided  into 
three  great  periods;  each  subdivided  into  lesser  por¬ 
tions  ;  each  with  its  own  peculiar  characteristics ;  each 
terminated  by  a  single  catastrophe. 

The  First  is  that  which,  reaching  back  for  its  pre¬ 
lude  into  the  Patriarchal  age,  commences,  properly 
speaking,  with  the  Exodus ;  and  then,  passing  through 
the  stages  of  the  Desert,  the  Conquest,  and  the  Set¬ 
tlement  in  Palestine,  ends  with  the  destruction  of  the 
Sanctuary  at  Shiloh,  and  the  absorption  of  the  ancient 
and  primitive  state  of  society  into  the  new  institution 
of  the  Monarchy.  It  includes  the  rise  of  the  tribes 
of  Joseph.  It  is  the  period  often,  though  somewhat 
inaccurately,  called  by  the  name  of  the  “  Theocracy.” 1 
Its  great  characters  are  Abraham,  Moses,  and  Samuel. 
It  embraces  the  first  Revelation  of  the  Mosaic  Religion 
and  the  first  foundation  of  the  Jewish  Church  and 
Commonwealth. 

The  Second  period  covers  the  whole  history  of  the 
Monarchy.  It  begins  with  the  first  rise  of  the  insti¬ 
tution  at  the  close  of  the  aristocracy  or  oligarchy  of 
the  Judges.  It  includes  the  Empire  of  David  and 
Solomon ;  and  then,  dividing  itself  into  the  two  sepa¬ 
rate  streams  of  the  Northern  and  Southern  kingdoms, 

1  See  Lectures  VIII.,  XVII.,  XVIII. 


XXX 


INTRODUCTION. 


terminates  in  the  overthrow  of  Jerusalem  and  the 
Temple  by  the  Chaldean  armies.  It  comprehends  the 
great  development  of  the  Jewish  Church  and  Religion 
through  the  growth  of  the  Prophetic  Order,  and  the 
first  establishment  of  the  Jewish  commonwealth  as  a 
fixed  institution.  It  is  marked  by  the  rise  and  fall 
of  the  tribe  of  Judah. 

The  Third  period  begins  with  the  Captivity.  It 
includes  the  Exile,  the  Return,  and  the  successive 
periods  of  Persian,  Grecian,  and  Roman  dominion.  It 
is  marked  by  the  rise  of  the  tribe  of  Levi  in  the 
Maccabean  dynasty;  by  the  growth  of  the  Jewish 
colonies  in  Egypt,  Babylonia,  and  the  West ;  and, 
lastly  and  chiefly,  by  the  formation  of  the  last  and 
greatest  development  of  the  Prophetic  Spirit,  out  of 
which  rose  the  Christian  Church,  and  the  consequent 
expansion  of  the  Jewish  Religion  into  a  higher  region; 
whilst  at  the  same  time  the  dissolution  of  the  exist¬ 
ing  Church  and  Commonwealth  of  Judaea  was  brought 
about  by  the  destruction  of  Jerusalem  and  of  the  Tem¬ 
ple,  in  the  war  of  Titus,  and  by  the  final  extinction 
of  the  national  independence,  in  the  war  of  Hadrian. 

The  present  volume  includes  the  first  portion  of  the 
History  extending  from  Abraham  to  Samuel,1  and  will, 
it  is  hoped,  be  followed  by  two  others,  bringing  down 
the  history  to  its  natural  conclusion. 

It  will  be  observed  that,  at  the  beginning  of  the 
several  sections,  I  have  prefixed  the  special  authorities 
treating  of  the  subjects  contained  in  them. 

Of  course  the  main  bulk  of  the  authorities  is  to  be 


1  From  the  extreme  uncertainty  any  dates.  In  the  second  and  third 
of  the  chronology  during  this  early  periods,  where  the  chronology  be- 
period,  I  have  abstained  from  affixing  comes  fixed,  the  case  is  different. 


INTRODUCTION.. 


XXXI 


found  in  the  Canonical  Books  of  the  Hebrew  Scrip¬ 
tures.  It  has  been  at  various  times  supposed  that 
the  Books  of  Moses,  Joshua,  and  Samuel,  were  all  writ¬ 
ten  in  their  present  form  by  those  whose  names  they 
bear.  This  notion,  however,  has  been  in  former  ages 
disputed  both  by  Jewish  and  Christian  theologians,  and 
is  now  rejected  by  almost  all  scholars.  It  has  no  foun¬ 
dation  in  the  several  Books  themselves,  and  is  contra¬ 
dicted  by  the  strong  internal  evidence  of  their  contents. 
To  determine  accurately  the  authorship  and  the  dates 
of  these  and  the  other  Sacred  Writings  is  a  question 
belonging  to  the  same  Biblical  Criticism,  which  has  thus 
modified  the  opinion  just  mentioned ;  and  to  those  who 
are  called  to  enter  into  the  details  of  such  inquiries 
I  gladly  leave  the  solution  of  this  problem.  But  there 
are,  meanwhile,  certain  helps  to  guide  us  in  the  study 
of  the  general  history,  which,  though  obvious  in  them¬ 
selves,  often  escape  the  notice  of  the  ordinary  theologi¬ 
cal  student. 

(1.)  The  history  of  the  Jewish  Church  and  People  is 
not  written  at  length  in  the  Jewish  Scriptures  Compari_ 
in  the  form  in  which  we  should  desire  ulti-  sacred the 
mately  to  possess  it.  The  order  of  the  books  Book9* 
as  they  stand  in  the  Canon  is  often  not  their  real 
order,  nor  are  the  events  themselves  always  related  in 
the  order  of  time.  Accordingly,  if  we  wish  to  have 
the  full  account  of  any  event  or  character,  we  must 
piece  it  together  from  various  books  or  passages,  often 
separated  from  each  other  by  considerable  intervals. 
Obvious  examples  of  this  are  to  be  found  in  the  illus¬ 
trations  furnished  to  the  life  of  David  by  the  Psalms, 
and  of  the  history  of  the  Jewish  Kings  by  the  Pro¬ 
phetical  writings.  Again,  portions  of  the  same  historical 
events  are  related  from  different  points  of  view,  or 


INTRODUCTION. 


xxxii 

with  fresh  incidents,  or  by  implication,  in  parts  of  the 
historical  books  where  we  should  least  expect  to  find 
them.  Thus  the  slaughter  of  Gideon’s  brothers,1  and 
a  long  untold  stage  of  his  career,  is  suggested  by  a 
single  allusion,  in  the  existing  narrative  to  events  of 
which  the  record  has  not  come  down  to  us ;  the 
storming  of  Hebron  by  Caleb 2  is  partly  made  up  from 
the  Book  of  Joshua  and  partly  from  that  of  the  Book 
of  Judges;  the  narratives3  affixed  to  the  end  of  the 
Book  of  Judges  must  chronologically  be  transferred  to 
the  beginning  of  the  period.  Many  of  these  scattered 
notices  are  ingeniously  collected  by  Professor  Blunt  as 
undesigned  evidences  to  the  truth  of  the  history ;  and, 
though  his  arguments  are  sometimes  too  fanciful  to 
be  safely  trusted,  yet  his  method  is  one  of  great 
value  to  the  historical  student,  and  is  the  same  which 
has  been  followed  out,  in  a  larger  and  more  critical 
spirit,  and  with  more  permanent  and  fruitful  results, 
in  Ewald’s  reconstruction  of  the  history  both  of  the 
Judges  and  of  David. 

(2.)  The  Books  of  the  Old  Testament,  in  their  present 
The  lost  form,  in  many  instances  are  not,  and  do  not 
profess  to  be,  the  original  documents  on  which 
the  history  was  based.  There  was  (to  use  a  happy 
expression  used  of  late)  a  u  Bible  within  a  Bible,”  an 
u  Old  Testament  before  an  Old  Testament  was  written.” 
To  discover  any  traces  of  these  lost  wrorks  in  the  act¬ 
ual  text,  or  any  allusions  to  them,  even  when  their 
substance  has  entirely  perished,  is  a  task  of  immense 
interest.  It  reveals  to  us  a  glimpse  of  an  earlier  world, 
of  an  extinct  literature,  such  as  always  rouses  innocent 
inquiry  to  the  utmost.  Such  is  the  ancient  document 

1  Judg.  viii.  18.  See  Lecture  XIV.  -  Josh.  xi.  13;  Judg.  i.  10.  See 

3  See  Lecture  XIII.  Lecture  XII. 


INTRODUCTION. 


XXX111 


describing  the  conquest  of  the  Eastern  kings  in  the 
14th  chapter  of  the  Book  of  Genesis ;  the  inestimable 
fragment  of  ancient  songs  in  the  21st  chapter  of  the 
Book  of  Numbers ;  the  quotations  from  the  Book  of 
Jasher,  in  the  Book  of  Joshua  and  the  First  Book 
of  Samuel.  Whenever  these  glimpses  occur,  they  de¬ 
serve  the  most  careful  attention.  We  are  brought  by 
them  years,  perhaps  centuries,  nearer  to  the  events 
described.  We  are  allowed  by  them  to  see  something 
of  the  construction  of  the  narrative  itself.  The  indi¬ 
cations  of  the  origin  of  the  different  documents  by 
variations  of  style,  by  the  use  of  peculiar  names  and 
titles,  may  be  too  minute  to  catch  the  attention  of 
any  except  a  professed  Hebrew  scholar.  But  the  points 
to  which  I  now  refer  are  open  to  the  consideration  of 
any  careful  student. 

(3.)  Yet,  again,  we  must  always  bear  in  mind  that 
the  history  of  the  Chosen  People  is  not  ex-  XheHe_ 
clusively  contained  in  the  Authorized  English  brew  text' 
version,  nor  even  only  in  the  Hebrew  text  from 
which  that  version  is  a  translation.  The  Authorized 
Version,  indeed,  is  a  sufficient  account  of  the  history 
for  the  general  purposes  of  popular  instruction.  But 
as  no  scholar  thinks  of  reading  Thucydides  even  in 
the  best  English  translation,  so  no  scholar  should  be 
satisfied  unless  he  at  least  endeavors  to  ascertain  how 
far  the  English  version  represents  the  original.  And 
in  proportion  to  the  value  we  attach  to  the  actual 
words  of  the  Bible  itself,  ought  to  be  the  care  not 
to  over-estimate  the  words  even  of  the  best  mod 
ern  translation.  The  variations  are,  perhaps,  not  im 
portant  as  to  the  general  sense.  But  as  to  the 
precise  life  and  force  of  each  word,  (I  speak  chiefly 
from  my  experience  of  a  single  department,  the  geo- 


XXXIV 


INTRODUCTION. 


graphical  vocabulary,)  they  are  very  considerable ; 
and  in  a  language  so  pregnant  as  the  Hebrew,  in¬ 
volve  often  serious  historical  consequences. 

The  Hebrew  text,  however,  is  not  our  only  source 
The  Sep-  0 f  information  as  to  the  original  materials 
tuagmt.  £pe  gacred  History.  Without  arguing  the 

relative  merits  of  the  Hebrew  and  the  Septuagint 
texts,  we  have  no  right  to  set  aside  or  neglect 
such  an  additional  authority  as  the  Septuagint  fur¬ 
nishes.  Whatever  may  be  the  value  of  the  He¬ 
brew  text  in  itself,  or  its  authority  in  the  present 
Jewish  Church,  or  the  present  Church  of  West¬ 
ern  Europe,  the  Septuagint  was  the  text  sanc¬ 
tioned  probably  by  our  Lord  Himself,  certainly  by  the 
Apostles,  and  still  acknowledged  by  the  whole  East. 
The  Septuagint  must,  therefore,  be  regarded  as  the 
Old  Testament  of  the  Apostolical,  and  of  the  early 
Catholic  Church.  And,  though  we  may  refuse  to  ac¬ 
knowledge  this  its  coordinate  authority  with  the 
received  text  of  our  present  Bible,  it  has  at  least 
the  value  of  the  very  oldest  Jewish  tradition  and 
commentary  on  the  Sacred  Text.  Therefore,  no  pas¬ 
sage  of  the  Sacred  History  can  be  considered  as  ex¬ 
hausted  unless  we  have  seen  how  it  is  represented 
by  the  Alexandrian  translators;  and  if,  as  is  often 
the  case,  we  find  variations  of  considerable  magnitude 
from  the  Hebrew,  such  variations  may  always  be  re¬ 
garded,  if  not  as  the  original  account  of  the  matter, 
at  least  as  explanations  and  traditions  of  high  an¬ 
tiquity.  Such,  for  example,  are  the  details  of  the 
descent  of  the  Eastern  kings,1  of  the  passage  of  the 
Jordan,2  of  the  execution  of  the  sons  of  Saul,3  of 
the  coronation  of  Jeroboam.4  The  Jews  of  Palestine, 

1  Gen.  xiv.  16.  2  Josh.  iv.  20.  3  2  Sam.  xxi.  16.  4  1  Kings  xii.  xiv. 

O 


INTRODUCTION. 


XXXV 


in  their  horror  of  a  rival  text,  —  perhaps  of  a  trans¬ 
lation  which  should  render  their  sacred  books  acces¬ 
sible  to  all  the  world,  —  held  that  on  the  day  on 
which  the  Seventy  Translators  met,  a  supernatural 
darkness  overspread  the  earth;  and  the  day  was  to 
them  one  of  their  solemn  periods  of  fasting  and  hu¬ 
miliation.  But  to  us,  who  know  what  the  Septuagint 
was  in  the  hands  of  the  Apostles,  as  the  means  of 
spreading  the  knowledge  of  the  Old  Testament 
through  the  Gentile  world  —  who,  in  the  scantiness  of 
any  remains  of  the  ancient  Jewish  literature,  gladly 
welcome  any  additional  information  to  fill  up  the  void 
—  who  feel  what  a  bulwark  this  double  version  of 
the  Old  Testament  furnishes  against  a  too  rigid  or 
literal  construction  of  the  Sacred  History  —  the  Sev¬ 
enty  Translators,  if  not  worthy  of  the  high  place  to 
which  the  ancient  Church  assigned  them,  may  well 
be  ranked  amongst  the  greatest  benefactors  of  Bib¬ 
lical  Literature  and  Free  Inquiry. 

(4.)  There  is  yet  another  class  of  authorities  to 
which  I  have  referred  whenever  occasion  of-  Heathen 
fered.  It  has  been  truly  said  that  the  history  tradltlons- 
of  the  Chosen  People  is  the  history,  not  of  an  in¬ 
spired  book,  but  of  an  inspired  people.  If  so,  any 
record  that  has  been  preserved  to  us  of  that  people, 
even  although  not  contained  in  their  own  sacred 
books,  is  far  too  precious  to  be  despised.  These  rec¬ 
ords  are  indeed  very  scanty.  They  consist  of  a  few 
fragments  of  Gentile  histories  preserved  by  Josephus, 
Eusebius,  and  Clement  of  Alexandria ;  a  few  state¬ 
ments  in  J ustin,  Tacitus,  and  Strabo ;  a  few  inscrip¬ 
tions  in  Egypt  and  Assyria ;  the  traditions  of  the 
East,  whether  preserved  in  Rabbinical,  Christian,  or 
Mussulman  legends ;  and  the  traditions  of  the  Jewish 


XXXVI 


INTRODUCTION. 


Church  itself,  as  preserved  by  Philo  and  Josephus. 
All  these  notices,  unequal  in  value  as  they  are  to 
each  other,  or  to  the  records  of  the  Old  Testament 
itself,  have  yet  this  use  —  that  they  recall  to  us  the 
existence  of  the  facts,  independent  of  the  authority 
of  the  Sacred  Books.  It  is  true  that  the  larger  part  of 
•  the  interest  and  instruction  of  the  Jewish  history 
would  be  lost  with  the  loss  of  the  Hebrew  Scriptures. 
But  their  original  influence  on  the  world  was  irre¬ 
spective  of  the  Scriptures,  and  must  always  continue. 

Even  had  we  only  the  imperfect  account  of  the 

Eastern  Jews  in  Tacitus  and  Strabo,  we  should  know 
traditions,  they  were  the  most  remarkable  nation  of 

ancient  Asia.  This  argument  applies  with  still  greater 
force  to  the  traditions  of  the  East,  and  to  the  tradi¬ 
tions  of  Josephus.  With  regard  to  the  former,  it  is 
impossible,  without  greater  knowledge  than  can  be 
obtained  by  one  who  is  ignorant  of  Arabic,  and  who 
has  only  visited  the  East  in  two  or  three  fugitive 
journeys,  to  ascertain  how  far  they  have  a  substantial 
existence  of  their  own,  or  how  far  they  are  mere  am¬ 
plifications  of  the  Koran  and  the  Old  Testament. 
Some  cases  —  such  as  the  wide-spread  prevalence  of 
the  name  of  “  Friend  ”  for  Abraham,  too  slightly  no¬ 
ticed  in  the  Bible1  to  have  been  derived  from  thence, 
and  the  importance  assigned  to  the  Arabian  Jethro  or 
Shouayb 2  —  seem  to  indicate  an  independent  origin. 
But,  whether  this  be  so  or  not,  they  continue  to  form 
the  staple  of  the  belief  of  a  large  part  of  mankind  on 
the  subject  of  the  Jewish  history,  and  as  such  I  have 
ventured  to  quote  them,  partly  in  order  to  contrast 
them  with  the  more  sober  style  of  the  Sacred  Records, 
but  chiefly  where  they  fall  in  with  the  general  spirit 
1  See  Lecture  I.  2  See  Lectures  V.,  VI. 


INTRODUCTION. 


xxxvii 

of  the  Biblical  narrative,  and  thus  furnish  an  instruc¬ 
tive,  because  unexpected,  illustration  of  it.  Many 
common  readers  may  be  struck  by  the  Persian  or 
Arabian  stories  of  Abraham  or  Moses,1  whose  minds 
have  by  long  custom  become  hardened  to  the  effect 
of  the  narrative  of  the  Bible  itself. 

The  traditions  of  Josephus  are  yet  more  significant. 
It  is  remarkable  that,  of  his  four  works,  two  Josephus, 
run  parallel  to  the  Old  Testament,  and  two  to  the 
New.  Whilst  the  histories  of  “the  Wars  of  the  Jews” 
and  of  his  own  “  Life  ”  throw  a  flood  of  light  by  con¬ 
temporary  allusions  on  the  time  of  the  Christian  era, 
the  “  Antiquities  ”  and  “  Controversy  with  Apion  ”  illus¬ 
trate  hardly  less  remarkably  the  times  of  the  Older 
Dispensation.  The  “  Controversy  with  Apion,”  indeed, 
is  chiefly  important  for  its  preservation  of  those  Gen¬ 
tile  traditions  to  which  I  have  before  referred.  But 
the  “Antiquities”  furnish  an  example  such  as  hardly 
occurs  elsewhere  in  ancient  literature  of  a  recent 
history  existing  side  by  side  with  most  of  the  original 
documents  from  which  it  is  compiled.  It  would  be  a 
curious  speculation,  which  would  test  the  value  of 
the  style  and  spirit  of  the  Sacred  writers,  to  imagine 
what  would  be  the  residuum  of  the  effect  produced 
by  the  Jewish  history  if  the  Old  Testament  were  lost, 
and  the  facts  were  known  to  us  only  through  the 
“Antiquities”  of  Josephus.  His  style  is  indeed  a  con¬ 
tinual  foil  to  that  of  the  Sacred  Narrative  —  his  ver¬ 
bosity  contrasted  with  its  simplicity,  his  vulgarity 
with  its  sublimity,  his  prose  with  its  poetry,  his  uni¬ 
formity  with  its  variety.  But,  with  all  these  draw¬ 
backs,  to  which  we  must  add  his  omissions  and  emen¬ 
dations,  as  if  to  meet  the  critical  eye  of  his  Roman 

1  See  Lectures  I.,  VIII. 


XXXV111 


INTRODUCTION. 


masters,  the  main  thread  of  the  story  is  faithfully 
retained ;  occasionally,  as  in  the  case  of  the  death  of 
Moses  and  Saul,1  a  true  pathos  steals  oyer  the  dull 
level ;  occasionally,  as  in  the  case  of  the  story  of  Ba¬ 
laam,  a  just  discernment  brings  out  clearly  the  moral 
elevation  peculiar  to  the  ancient  Scriptures.  But 
there  is  a  yet  further  interest.  His  account  is  filled 
with  variations  not  to  be  explained  by  any  of  the  dif¬ 
ferences  just  cited.  To  examine  the  origin  of  these 
would  be  an  interesting  task.  Sometimes  he  coin¬ 
cides  with  the  variations  of  the  Septuagint ;  and  in 
case  where  he  seems  not  to  have  copied  from  that 
Version,  his  statement  must  be  considered  as  a  confir¬ 
mation  of  the  value  of  the  text  which  the  Septuagint 
has  followed.  Sometimes  he  supplies  facts  which  agree 
with  existing  localities,  but  have  no  direct  connection 
with  the  Sacred  Narrative  either  in  Hebrew  or  Greek, 
as  is  his  account  of  the  mountain  (evidently  Jebel 
Attaka)  which  hemmed  in  the  Israelites  at  the  Bed 
Sea,  of  the  traditional  sanctity  of  Sinai,  and  of  the 
still  existing  manna.2  Sometimes  he  makes  statements 
which  are  not  found  in  the  narrative  itself,  but  wdiich 
remarkably  illustrate  indirect  allusions  contained  either 
in  the  history  or  in  other  parts  of  the  Old  Testa¬ 
ment  —  as,  for  example,  the  thunder-storm  at  the  Bed 
Sea,  which  coincides  very  slightly  with  the  narrative 
in.  Exodus,  but  exactly  and  fully  with  the  allusions 
in  the  77th  Psalm; 3  or  the  slaughter  in  the  torrent 
of  Arnon,  which  has  no  foundation  in  the  Mosaic  nar¬ 
rative,  but  is  the  natural  explanation  of  the  ancient 
song  preserved  in  the  Book  of  Numbers.4  In  a  more 
critical  historian  these  additions  might  be  considered 

3  Ibid.  iii. ;  i.  §§  6,  7  ;  v.  1 ;  ii.  xv.  1 . 

4  Ibid.  ii.  16,  §  3  ;  iv.  5,  §  2. 


1  Ant.  iv.  8.  §  48 ;  vi.  14,  §  7. 

2  Ibid.  iv.  6. 


INTRODUCTION. 


xxxix 


mere  amplifications  of  the  slight  hints  furnished  by 
the  original  writers,  but  in  Josephus  it  seems  reason¬ 
able  (and,  in  that  case,  becomes  deeply  interesting) 
to  ascribe  them  to  an  independent  source  of  informa¬ 
tion,  common  to  the  tradition  which  he  used,  and  to 
the  occasional  allusions  in  the  Sacred  writers.  Some¬ 
times  his  variations  consist  simply  of  new  information, 
capable  neither  of  proof  or  disproof,  but  receiving  a 
certain  degree  of  support  from  the  simplicity  and 
probability  which  distinguishes  them  from  common 
Rabbinical  legends ;  such  as  the  story  of  Hur  being  the 
husband  of  Miriam,1  or  of  the  rite  of  the  red  heifer 
having  its  origin  in  her  funeral.2  Finally,  other  state¬ 
ments  exist,  which  agree  with  the  Oriental  or  Gentile 
traditions  already  quoted,  and  thus  reciprocally  yield 
and  receive  a  limited  confirmation ;  as,  for  instance, 
Abraham’s  connection  with  the  contemplation  of  the 
stars,3  and  the  great  deeds  of  Moses  in  Egypt.4 


Such  are  the  main  authorities.  In  using  them  for 
these  Lectures,  it  will  sometimes  happen  that  they 
hardly  profess,  or  can  hardly  be  proved  to  contain, 
the  statement  of  the  original  historical  facts  to  which 
they  relate.  But  they  nevertheless  contain  the  near¬ 
est  approach  which  we,  at  this  distance  of  time,  can 
now  make  to  a  representation  of  those  facts.  They 
are  the  refraction  of  the  history,  if  not  the  history 
itself,  —  the  echo  of  the  words,  if  not  the  actual  words. 
And,  throughout,  it  has  been  my  endeavor  to  lay 
stress  on  those  portions  and  those  elements  of  the 


1  See  Lecture  VI. 

2  See  Lecture  VIII. 


3  See  Lecture  I. 

4  See  Lecture  V. 


xl 


INTRODUCTION. 


Sacred  Story,  which  have  hitherto  stood,  and  are 
likely  to  stand,  the  investigations  of  criticism,  and 
from  which  may  be  drawn  the  most  solid  instruction 
for  all  times. 

There  may  be  errors  in  chronology  —  exaggerations 
in  numbers  —  contradictions  between  the  different 
narratives.  These  may  compel  us  to  relinquish  one  or 
other  of  the  numerous  hypotheses  which  have  been 
formed  respecting  the  composition  or  the  inspiration 
of  the  Old  Testament.  But  as  they  would  not  destroy 
the  value  of  other  history,  so  they  need  not  destroy 
the  value  of  this  history  because  it  relates  to  Sacred 
subjects ;  or  prevent  us  from  making  the  very  most 
of  those  portions  of  it  which  are  undeniably  his¬ 
torical,  or  full  of  the  widest  and  most  permanent 
lessons,  both  for  "the  example  of  life  and  instruction 
of  manners,”  and  for  "the  establishment  of”  true 
religious  "  doctrine.” 


THE  PATRIARCHS. 

- ♦ - 

I.  THE  CALL  OF  ABRAHAM, 
n.  ABRAHAM  AND  ISAAC. 

in;  jacob. 

IV.  ISRAEL  IN  EGYPT. 


1 


SPECIAL  AUTHORITIES  FOR  THIS  PERIOD. 


1.  Gen.  xi.  27-1.  26  (Hebrew  and  Septuagint)  ;  Josh.  xxiv.  2-15 ; 

Neh.  ix.  7,  8 ;  Ps.  cv.  6-23  ;  Hos.  xii.  3,  4,  12  ;  Isa.  li.  2. 

2.  The  earlier  Jewish  traditions:  in  Ecclus.  xliv.  19-23;  Judith  v. 

6-11 ;  Acts  vii.  1-16  ;  Josephus,  Ant.  i.  7-ii.  8  ;  Philo,  De  Migra- 
tione  Abrahami,  De  Abrahamo,  and  De  Josepho. 

3.  The  Heathen  traditions  preserved  by  Berosus,  Nicolaus  of  Damascus, 

Hecatceus  of  Abdera,  Cleodemus  Malchus  (in  Josephus,  Ant.  i. 
ch.  7,  15),  Eupolemus,  Artapanus,  Apollonius  Melon,  Alexander 
Polyhistor,  Theodotus,  Aristasus,  and  Demetrius  (in  Eusebius, 
Prcep.  JEv.  ix.  16-25),  Justin  (xxxvi.  2). 

4.  The  later  Jewish  traditions  in  the  Talmud  and  the  Targum  Pseudo- 

jonathan ;  and  collected  in  Otho’s  Lexicon  Rabbinico-philologicum 
(Altona,  1757),  and  in  Beer’s  Leben  Abrahams  (Leipsic,  1859). 

5.  The  Mussulman  traditions  scattered  throughout  the  Koran,  collected 

in  D’Herbelot’s  Bibliotheque  Orientate  (“  Abraham  ;  ”  “  Ishak ;  ” 
“Jacob;”  “ Jousouf”)  ;  and  conveniently  arranged  in  Lane’s 
Selections  from  the  Kur-an ,  §§  12,  13:  Weil’s  Biblical  Legends 
(London,  1846),  pp.  47-90  :  and  Jalal-addi'n,  Hist,  of  Temple  of 
Jerus.  (London,  1836),  ch.  xi.-xv.  The  Persian  legends  in  Hyde, 
De  Religione  Veterum  Persarum,  ch.  2,  3. 

6.  The  Christian  traditions:  in  Fabricius’s  Codex  Pseudepigraphus  Vet. 

Testamenti,  pp.  311-800  :  Suidas,  Lexicon  (“Abraham”). 


THE  PATRIARCHS. 


LECTURE  I. 

THE  CALL  OF  ABRAHAM. 

The  Patriarchal  Age  is  not  in  itself  the  beginning 
of  the  history  of  the  Jewish  Church  or  nation.  That, 
as  we  shall  see,  has  its  origin  from  Moses.  But  the 
more  primitive  period  is  the  necessary  prelude  of  that 
history,  because  it  contains  the  earliest  distinct  begin¬ 
nings  of  the  Jewish  religion  and  of  the  Jewish  race. 
It  is  in  this  sense  that  the  first  event  in  this  period 
may  fitly  be  treated  as  the  opening  of  all  Ecclesias¬ 
tical  History,  as  the  first  historical  commencement  of 
a  religious  community  and  worship,  which  has  contin¬ 
ued  ever  since,  without  interruption,  into  the  Chris¬ 
tian  Church,  such  as,  with  all  its  manifold  diversities, 
it  now  exists.  This  event,  according  as  it  is  appre¬ 
hended  from  its  human  or  its  Divine  side,  may  he 
described  as  “the  Migration,”  or  as  “the  Call”  of 
Abraham.  In  every  crisis  of  history  these  two  ele¬ 
ments  in  their  measure  may  be  perceived,  the  one 
secular,  the  other  religious ;  the  one  belonging  merely 
to  the  past,  the  other  reaching  forward  into  the  re¬ 
motest  future.  In  this  instance,  both  are  set  dis¬ 
tinctly  before  us  in  the  Biblical  narrative,  side  by 
side,  as  if  in  almost  unconscious  independence  of  each 
other.  “  And  Terah  took  Abram  his  son ,  and  Lot  the  son 


4 


THE  CALL  OF  ABRAHAM. 


Lect.  I 


“of  Haran  his  son's  son,  and  Sarai  his  daughter-in-law , 
“  his  son  Abrams  wife ;  and  they  ivent  forth  with  them 
“  [LXX.  “  he  led  them  ”]  from  Ur  of  the  Chaldees ,  to 
“  go  into  the  land  of  Canaan :  and  they  came  unto  Haran , 
“  and  dwelt  there.  .  .  .  And  Abram  took  Sarai  his 
“  ivife ,  and  Lot  his  brother's  son,  and  all  their  substance 
“  that  they  had  gathered,  and  the  souls  that  they  had  gotten 
“  [the  slaves  that  they  had  bought]  in  Haran  ;  and  they 
“  ivent  forth  to  go  into  the  land  of  Canaan ;  and  into  the 
“  land  of  Canaan  they  came  ”  This  is  the  external  as¬ 
pect  of  the  Migration.1 2  A  family,  a  tribe  of  the  great 
Semitic  race,  moves  westward  from  the  cradle  of  its 
earliest  civilization.  There  was  nothing  outwardly  to 
distinguish  them  from  those  who  had  descended  from 
the  Caucasian  range  into  the  plains  of  the  south  in 
former  times,  or  who  would  do  so  in  times  yet  to 
come.  There  was,  however,  another  aspect  which  the 
surrounding  tribes  saw  not,  but  which  is  the  only 
point  that  we  now  see  distinctly.  “  The  Lord  c  said 9  2 
“  unto  Abram,  Get  thee  out  of  thy  country,  and  from  thy  kin- 
“  dred,  and  from  thy  father's  house,  unto  a  land  that  I  will 
“  show  thee :  and  I  will  make  of  thee  a  great  nation,  and 
“  I  will  bless  thee,  and  make  thy  name  great ;  and  thou 
“  shalt  be  a  blessing :  and  I  will  bless  them  that  bless  thee, 
“  and  curse  him  that  curseth  thee  :  and  in  thee  shall  all  the 
“families  of  the  earth  be  blessed Interpret  these  words 
as  we  will ;  give  them  a  meaning  more  or  less  literal, 
more  or  less  restricted ;  yet  with  what  a  force  do  they 
break  in  upon  the  homeliness  of  the  rest  of  the  nar¬ 
rative  :  what  an  impulse  do  they  disclose  in  the  inner¬ 
most  heart  of  the  movement:  what  a  long  vista  do 

1  This  is  the  title  of  Philo’s  first  “  had  said,”  is  an  alteration  of  the 

treatise  on  Abraham.  text,  probably  to  meet  the  statement 

2  The  tense  in  the  English  version,  of  Acts  vii.  2. 


THE  MIGRATION  OF  ABRAHAM 


to  Orfa 


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Major  &.  tifUivv.  44,4  _Z>  roadway  Wo-rTc 


Lect.  I. 


THE  MIGRATION. 


5 


they  open,  even  to  the  very  close  of  the  history,  of 
which  this  was  the  first  beginning! 

Let  us  then  follow  the  example  of  the  sacred  narra¬ 
tive  by  drawing  out  both  these  views  of  the  event. 
Take,  first,  its  outward  character  as  a  national  or  mi¬ 
gratory  movement. 

I.  The  name  of  Abraham,  as  we  shall  afterwards  see 
more  fully,  is  not  confined  to  the  Sacred  His-  The  Migra_ 
tory.  Over  and  above  the  Book  of  Genesis, tion- 
there  are  two  main  sources  of  information.  We  have 
the  fragments  preserved  to  us  by  Josephus  and  Eusebius 
from  Greek  or  Asiatic  writers.  We  have  also  the  Jew¬ 
ish  and  Mussulman  traditions,  as  represented  chiefly  in 
the  Talmud  and  the  Koran.  It  is  in  the  former  class 
—  those  presented  to  us  by  the  Pagan  historians  —  that 
the  migration  of  Abraham  assumes  its  most  purely  secu¬ 
lar  aspect.  They  describe  him  as  a  great  man  of  the 
East,  well  read  in  the  stars,  or  as  a  conquering  Prince 
who  swept  all  before  him  on  his  way  to  Palestine. 
These  characteristics,  remote  as  they  are  from  our  com¬ 
mon  view,  have  nevertheless  their  point  of  contact  with 
the  Biblical  account,  which,  simple  as  it  is,  implies  more 
than  it  states. 

In  the  darkness  of  this  distant  past,  the  most  distinct 
images  we  can  now  hope  to  recall  are  those  of  IJrofthe 
the  place  and  scene  of  the  event.  Where  was  Chaldees- 
“  Ur  of  the  Chaldees  ?  ” 1  It  would  seem  at  first  sight 
as  if  this,  the  most  solid  footing  on  which  we  could  rely, 
shifted  beneath  our  feet  so  rapidly  as  to  deprive  us  of 
any  standing  ground  whatever.  The  name  itself  of 
“  Chasdim  ”  or  “  Chaldsea  ”  has,  in  the  progress  of  centu¬ 
ries,  descended  like  a  landslip  from  the  northern  Arme- 

1  “Ur  Chasdim,”  i.  e.  “  Ur  of  the  people  of  Chesed”  —  as  it  is  expressed 
in  the  original. 


6 


THE  CALL  OF  ABRAHAM. 


Lect.  I 


nian  mountains;  to  which  it  originally  belonged,  into  the 
southern  limits  of  Mesopotamia,  which  claimed  it  in 
after-times.  This  is  the  first  source  of  confusion.  Is  it 
the  northern  or  southern,  the  ancient  or  the  more  recent 
Chaldsea,  of  which  we  are  speaking  ?  But,  besides  this, 
the  name  of  Ur  also  seems  to  have^been  sown  broadcast 
over  the  whole  region.  One  is  pointed  out  near  Nisi- 
bis,  another  near  Nineveh;  a  third  and  fourth  have 
lately  been  found  in  the  neighborhood  of  Babylon.  It 
is  perhaps  the  most  probable  solution  that  the  name 
originally  meant  (as  the  Septuagint  translators  have  ren¬ 
dered  it)  a  country  rather  than  a  place.  But  no  argu¬ 
ments  advanced,  even  by  the  high  authority  of  recent 
discoverers,  seem  as  yet  sufficiently  established  to  dis¬ 
turb  the  old  and  general  tradition  which  fixes  the  chief 
centre  of  the  early  movements  of  the  tribe  of  Abraham 
at  the  place  variously  known  as  Orfa,  Roha,  Orchoe, 
Callirhoe,  Chaldseopolis,  Edessa,  Antioch  of  the  far  East, 
Erech,1  Ur ;  and,  were  it  more  in  doubt  than  it  is,  the 
singular  ecclesiastical  position  occupied  by  this  city  of 
many  names  calls  for  a  few  words  in  passing. 

In  Christian  times,  it  was  celebrated  as  the  capital  of 
orfa.  Abgarus,  Agbarus,  or  Akbar,  who  received, 
according  to  the  ancient  tradition,  the  letter  and  por¬ 
trait  of  our  Saviour,2  and  thus  became  the  first  Christian 
king.  Gradually  it  was  invested  with  a  sacred  preemi¬ 
nence,  as  the  cradle,  the  university,  the  metropolis  of 
the  Christianity  of  the  remote  East.  Within  its  walls 
lived  and  died  and  is  buried  the  chief  saint  of  the  Syrian 
Church,  Ephrem,  Deacon  of  Edessa.  In  its  neighbor- 

1  Bayer,  Historia  Osrhoene  et  Edes-  messenger,  attacked  by  thieves,  drop- 

sena,  3.  ped  the  letter,  which  gave  the  spring 

2  A  well  was  shown  in  Pococke’s  a  miraculous  character, 
time  ( Travels ,  i  160),  in  which  the 


Lect.  I. 


UR  OF  THE  CHALDEES. 


7 


hood,  in  strange  conformity  with  its  earliest  history 
wandered  a  race  of  hermits,  not  monastic  or  coenobitic, 
but  nomadic  and  pastoral,  who  took  to  the  desert  life, 
and  almost1  literally  grazed  like  sheep  on  the  desert 
herbage.  In  later  times,  yet  again,  it  became  the  seat 
of  a  Christian  principality  under  the  chiefs  of  the  First 
Crusade.  But  whilst  these  later  glories  of  Edessa  are 
gathered  from  books,  the  stories  of  Abraham  alone  still 
live  in  the  mouths  of  the  Arab  inhabitants  of  Orfa, 
and  in  the  peculiarities  of  its  remarkable  situation. 
The  city  lies  on  the  edge  of  one  of  the  bare,  rugged 
spurs  which  descend  from  the  mountains  of  Armenia 
into  the  Assyrian  plains,2  in  the  cultivated  land  which, 
as  lying  under  those  mountains,  is  called  Padan-Aram. 
Two  physical  features  must  have  secured  it,  from  the 
earliest  times,  as  a  nucleus  for  the  civilization  of  those 
regions.  One  is  a  high  crested  crag,  the  natural  for¬ 
tification  of  the  present  citadel,  doubly  defended  by  a 
trench  of  immense  depth,  cut  out  of  the  living  rock 
behind  it.  The  other  is  an  abundant  spring,3  issuing 
in  a  pool  of  transparent  clearness,  and  embosomed  in 
a  mass  of  luxuriant  verdure,  which,  amidst  the  dull 
brown  desert  all  around,  makes,  and  must  always  have 
made,  this  spot  an  oasis,  a  paradise,  in  the  Chaldaean 
wilderness.  Round  this  sacred  pool,  “  The  Beautiful 
Spring,”  “Callirhoe,”  as  it  was  called  by  the  Greek 
writers,  gather  the  modern  traditions  of  the  Patriarch. 
Hard  by,  amidst  its  cypresses,  is  the  mosque  on  the 
spot  where  he  is  said  to  have  offered  his  first  prayer : 
the  cool  spring  itself  burst  forth  in  the  midst  of 

1  Tillemont,  S.  Ephrem ,  ch.  16,  17.  3  At  times  it  swells  into  a  flood, 

2  Olivier  (  Voyage  a  Syrie,  iv.  329)  and  is  hence  called  Daizon  or  Scirtua 
gives  a  good  description  of  the  several  (  “  the  leaper  ”  ),  Bayer,  14. 

zones  of  Mesopotamia. 


8 


THE  CALL  OF  ABRAHAM. 


Lect.  I. 


the  fiery  furnace1  which  the  infidels  had  kindled  to 
burn  him ;  its  sacred  fish,  swarming  by  thousands  and 
thousands,  from  their  long-continued  preservation,  are 
cherished  by  the  faithful  as  under  his  special  patron¬ 
age;  the  two  Corinthian  columns  which  stand  on  the 
crag  above  are  made  to  commemorate  his  deliverance. 
In  the  first  centuries  of  the  Christian  era  we  know 
that  other  memorials  of  the  Patriarchal  age  were 
pointed  out.  The  year  of  Abraham  was  long  adopted 
in  Edessa  as  the  epoch  of  its  dates.2  Josephus  speaks 
of  the  sepulchre  of  Haran,  still  shown  in  his  time  at 
Ur;  Eusebius3  speaks  of  the  tent  which  Jacob  inhab¬ 
ited  whilst  feeding  the  flocks  of  Laban,  as  preserved 
till  it  was  accidentally  burnt  by  lightning  in  the 
second  century.  But,  apart  from  all  such  transitory 
and  doubtful  reminiscences  as  these,  we  may  well  be¬ 
lieve  that  the  high  rock,  the  clear  spring,  the  burst 
of  verdure,  must  have  as  truly  made  this  (such 
might  be  a  possible  interpretation  of  the  name)  “  the 
light  of  the  race  of  Arphaxad”  (Ur  Chasdim),  as  the 
like  circumstances  made  Damascus  “  the  eye  of  the 
East;”  and  amongst  the  countless  sepulchres  which 
fill  the  rocky  hill4  behind  the  city,  some  may  reach 
back  to  the  earliest  times  of  human  habitation  and 
interment. 

From  this  spot,  invested  with  a  tender  attractiveness 
from  which  even  the  passing  traveller 5  reluctantly 
tears  himself  away,  we  may  believe  that  the  family 
of  Abraham  were  called.  Was  it,  as  according  to  u  Jose- 

1  This  probably  arose  from  a  mis-  4  It  is  now  called  “  Top-dag,”  the 
conception  of  the  words  “  He  came  hill  of  the  cannon.  Olivier,  iv.  226. 

“  out  of  Ur,”  i.  e.  “  the  light,”  or  5  I  owe  this,  and  much  else  of  the 
'l  fire.”  impressions  of  Orfa  (which  I  have  not 

2  Bayer,  24.  myself  visited),  to  the  kind  informa- 

3  Chron.  22.  tion  of  two  recent  travellers. 


Lect.  I. 


HARAN. 


9 


phus,”1  the  grief  of  Terah  over  the  untimely  death 
of  Haran  ?  Was  it,  as  according  to  the  tradition  fob 
lowed  by  Stephen,  that  the  higher  call  had  already 
been  made  to  Abraham?2  We  know  not.  We  are 
told  only  that  they  went  southward :  they  went  upon 
the  track  which  Chaldaeans,  and  Medes,  and  Persians, 
and  Curds,  and  Tartars,  afterwards  in  long  succession 
followed,  as  if  towards  the  rich  plains  of  Nineveh  or 
of  Babylon. 

One  day’s  journey  from  Ur,  if  Orfa  be  Ur,  was  the 
spot  which  they  chose  for  their  encampment3  Haran. 

—  Haran,  Charran,  Carrhae.  That  it  was  a  place  of 
note  may  be  gathered  from  its  long-continued  name 
and  fame  in  later  days.  As  the  sanctuary  of  the 
Moon  goddess,  it  was,  far  into  the  Roman  Empire, 
regarded  as  the  centre  of  Eastern  Paganism,  in  rivalry 
to  Edessa,  the  centre  of  Eastern  Christendom.  It 
was  the  scene,  too,  of  the  memorable  defeat  of  Cras- 
sus.  But  no  modern  traveller,  up  to  the  present  time, 
has  left  a  written  account  of  this  world-old  place. 
There  is  hardly  anything  to  tell  us  why  it  was  fixed 
upon  either  as  the  scene  of  that  fierce  conflict,  or  as 
the  scene  of  the  Patriarchal  settlement.  Only  we 
observe  that  it  is  the  point  of  divergence  between 
the  great 4  caravan  routes  towards  the  various  fords  of 
the  Euphrates  on  the  one  hand,  and  the  Tigris  on  the 
other ;  and  therefore  must  have  had  some  marked 
features  to  make  it  a  fitting  encampment  both  for 
Roman  general  and  Chaldaean  Patriarch.  Beside  the 


1  Jos.  Ant.  i.  7,  1. 

2  Acts  vii.  4.  Philo,  i.  464 ;  per¬ 
haps  Neh.  ix.  7. 

3  Visible  from  Orfa  almost  at  all 
times  (Ainsworth,  Assyria,  Babylonia , 

Chaldcea,  153),  The  surrounding 


country  is  well  described  in  Merivale’s 
Hist,  of  Romans  under  the  Empire , 
i.  520,  and,  with  elaborate  learning,  ir. 
Chwolson’s  Ssabier ,  i.  304. 

4  Ritter,  vii.  296.  As  such  it  seemj 
to  be  mentioned  in  Ezekiel  xxvii.  23. 


10 


THE  CALL  OF  ABRAHAM. 


Lect.  L 


settlement,  too,  were  the  wells,1  round  which  for  the 
next  generations  one  large  portion  of  the  tribe  of 
Terah  continued  to  linger;  and  the  settlers  in  the 
distant  west  are  described  as  still  retaining  their  affec¬ 
tion  for  the  ancient  sanctuary,2  where  the  father  of 
their  race  was  buried,  and  whence  they  sought,  ac¬ 
cording  to  the  true  Arabian  usage,  their  own  kins¬ 
women  and  cousins  in  marriage. 

But  for  the  highest  spirit  of  the  Patriarchal  family 
Passage  Haran  could  not  be  a  permanent  abiding-place. 
Euphrates.  6(  The  great  river,”  “  the  river,”  as  his  de¬ 
scendants  called  it,  the  river  Euphrates,  rolled  its  vast 
boundary  of  waters  between  him  and  the  remote  coun¬ 
try  to  which  his  steps  were  bent.  Two  days’  journey 
brought  him  to  the  high  chalk  cliffs  which  overlook 
the  wide  western  desert.  Broad  and  strong  lay  the 
great  stream  beneath  and  between.  He  crossed  over 
it,  probably  near  the  same  point  where  it  is  still 
forded.3  He  crossed  it,  and  became  (such  at  least 
was  one  interpretation  always  put  upon  the  word) 
Abraham,  “  the  Hebrew”  the  man  who  had  crossed 4  the 
river  flood  —  the  man  who  came  from  beyond  the  Eu¬ 
phrates. 

For  seven  days’ journey 5  or  more,  the  caravan  would 
Damascus,  advance  along  what  is  still  the  main  desert 
road  to  Syria.  Nothing  is  said  in  history  of  their 
route.  It  is  but  an  etymological  legend  which  con¬ 
nects  Aleppo6  with  the  herds  of  the  Patriarch’s  pas- 

1  Nieb.  Trav.  ii.  410.  Gen.  xxix.  2.  4  LXX.  Gen.  xiv.  13,  6  tt epdrijc, 

2  Gen.  xi.  31,  xxix.  4.  Ewald,  Renan,  Langues  Semitiques ,  i.  108. 

Geschichte,  i.  4t\S.  5  Gen.  xxxi.  23.  Ritter,  West  Asia, 

3  Zeugma,  the  ancient  passage,  was  vii.  296. 

a  little  west  of  the  present  passage  at  6  “  Haleb,”  the  milk  of  Abraham’s 
Birs.  Olivier  (iv.  215)  compares  it  in  cow.  See  the  legend  in  Porter’s 
size  and  rapidity  to  the  Rhone.  Handbook  of  Syria ,  613. 


Lect.  I. 


HIS  OUTWARD  APPEARANCE. 


11 


toral  tribe.  They  neared  the  range  of  the  Lebanon 
which  screened  the  Holy  Land  from  their  view;  and 
underneath  its  shade  they  rested,  for  the  last  time,  in 
Damascus.1  It  is  curious  that  whilst  the  connection 
of  Abraham  with  this  most  ancient  of  cities  is  almost 
entirely  derived  from  extraneous  sources,  it  is  yet 
sufficiently  confirmed  by  the  sacred  narrative  to  be 
worthy  of  credit.  “  Abraham,”  we  are  told,  “  was  king 
“of  Damascus.”2  He  had  crossed  the  desert  with  his 
tribe,  as  not  many  years  afterwards  came  Chedorlao- 
mer  and  the  kings  of  the  East ;  and,  as  they  descended 
on  the  green  oasis  of  Siddim,  so  this  earlier  conqueror 
established  himself  in  the  green  oasis  of  Damascus,  the 
likeness,  on  a  larger  scale,  of  his  own  native  Ur.  In 
later  ages  his  name  was  still  honored  in  the  region ; 
and  a  spot  pointed  out  as  “  Abraham’s  dwelling-place.” 
And  in  the  primitive  play  on  the  name 3  of  Abraham’s 
faithful  slave,  preserved  in  the  sacred  record,  we  have 
a  guaranty  of  the  close  tie  which  subsisted  between 
the  patriarch  and  his  earliest  conquest.  “Eliezer  of 
Damascus”  was  the  lasting  trophy  of  his  victory. 

As  we  pause  at  the  last  halting-place  before  his 
entrance  into  Palestine,  let  us  look  more  fully  in  the 
face  the  great  character  that  we  have  brought  thus 
far  on  his  way. 

Not  many  years  ago  much  offence  was  given 
by  one,  now  a  high  dignitary  in  the  English  Likeness  to 
Church,  who  ventured  to  suggest  the  original  chiefs. 


1  Compare  the  descent  of  the  Ara¬ 
maeans  on  Damascus  from  Kir  in  Ar¬ 
menia,  Amos  ix.  7. 

2  Justin,  xxxvi.  2.  Nicolaus  of 
Damascus  (Jos.  Ant.  i.  7,  2). 

3  Gen.  xv.  2.  Ewald,  i.  366.  It  is 
lost  in  the  English,  but  preserved  in 


the  Greek,  version  —  “  This  son  of 
“  Masek  is  Damasek  Eliezer.”  The 
Arab  tradition  makes  Eliezer’s  name 
to  have  been  “  Dimshak,”  and  the 
origin  of  the  name  of  the  city.  D’Her- 
belot,  “  Abraham”  and  “  Damaschk,” 
i.  209. 


12 


i 


THE  CALL  OF  ABRAHAM. 


Lect.  I, 


likeness  of  Abraham,  by  calling  him  a  Bedouin  Sheik. 
It  is  one  advantage  flowing  from  the  multiplication  of 
Eastern  travels  that  such  offence  could  now  no  longer  be 
taken.  Every  English  pilgrim  to  the  Holy  Land,  even  the 
most  reverential  and  the  most  fastidious,  is  delighted  to 
trace  and  to  record  the  likeness  of  patriarchal  manners 
and  costumes  in  the  Arabian  chiefs.  To  refuse  to  do  so 
would  be  to  decline  the  use  of  what  we  may  almost  call  a 
singular  gift  of  Providence.  The  unchanged  habits  of  the 
East  render  it  in  this  respect  a  kind  of  living  Pompeii. 
The  outward  appearances,  which  in  the  case  of  the 
Greeks  and  Romans  we  know  only  through  art  and 
writing,  through  marble,  fresco,  and  parchment,  in  the 
case  of  Jewish  history  we  know  through  the  forms 
of  actual  men,  living  and  moving  before  us,  wearing 
almost  the  same  garb,  speaking  in  almost  the  same 
language,  and  certainly  with  the  same  general  turns 
of  speech  and  tone  and  manners.  Such  as  we  see 
them  now,  starting  on  a  pilgrimage  or  a  journey, 
were  Abraham  and  his  sister’s  son,  when  they  “  went 
“  forth  ”  to  go  into  the  land  of  Canaan.  “  All  their 
a  substance  that  they  had  gathered  ”  is  heaped  high 
on  the  backs  of  their  kneeling  camels.  The  “  slaves 
“  that  they  had  bought  in  Haran  ”  run  along  by  their 
sides.  Round  about  them  are  their  flocks  of  sheep 
and  goats,  and  the  asses  moving  underneath  the  tow¬ 
ering  forms  of  the  camels.  The  chief  is  there,  amidst 
the  stir  of  movement,  or  resting  at  noon  within  his 
black  tent,  marked  out  from  the  rest  by  his  cloak  of 
brilliant  scarlet,  by  the  fillet  of  rope  which  binds  the 
loose  handkerchief  round  his  head,  by  the  spear  which 
he  holds  in  his  hand  to  guide  the  march,  and  to  fix 
the  encampment.  The  chief’s  wife,  the  princess1  of 

1  “  Sarah  ”  =  princess.  “  Sarai  ”  =  my  princess. 


Lect.  I. 


HIS  OUTWARD  APPEARANCE. 


13 


the  tribe,  is  there  in  her1  own  tent,  to  make  the 
cakes,  and  prepare  the  usual  meal2  of  milk  and  but¬ 
ter;  the  slave  or  the  child  is  ready  to  bring  in  the 
red  3  lentile  soup  for  the  weary  hunter,  or  to  kill  the 
calf  for  the  unexpected  guest.4  Even  the  ordinary 
social  state  is  the  same :  polygamy,  slavery,  the  ex¬ 
clusiveness  of  family  ties ;  the  period  of  service  for 
the  dowry  of  a  wife;  the  solemn  obligations  of  hospi¬ 
tality;  the  temptations,  easily  followed,  into  craft  or 
falsehood. 

In  every  aspect,  except  that  which  most  concerns 
us,  the  likeness  is  complete  between  the  Bedouin 
chief  of  the  present  day,  and  the  Bedouin  chief  who 
came  from  Chaldaea  nearly  four  thousand  years  ago.  In 
every  aspect  but  one  ;  and  that  one  contrast  is  set  off  in 
the  highest  degree  by  the  resemblance  of  all  besides. 
The  more  we  see  the  outward  conformity  of  Abraham 
and  his  immediate  descendants  to  the  godless,  grasping, 
foul-mouthed  Arabs  of  the  modern  desert,  nay  even 
their  fellowship  in  the  infirmities  of  their  common 
state  and  country,  the  more  we  shall  recognize  the 
force  of  the  religious  faith,  which  has  raised  them 
from  that  low  estate  to  be  the  heroes  and  saints  of 
their  people,  the  spiritual  fathers  of  European  religion 
and  civilization.  The  hands  are  the  hands  of  the  Bed¬ 
ouin  Esau;  but  the  voice  is  the  voice  of  Abraham, 
Isaac,  and  Jacob,  —  the  voice  which  still  makes  itself 
heard  across  deserts  and  continents  and  seas;  heard 
wherever  there  is  a  conscience  to  listen,  or  an  imag¬ 
ination  to  be  pleased,  or  a  sense  of  reverence  left 
amongst  mankind. 

Gen.  xxiv.  67.  4  por  the  Arab  life  in  Chaldaea, 

2  Gen.  xviii.  2-8.  see  Loftus,  Chaldcea  and  Susiana , 

3  Gen.  xxv.  34.  156. 


14 


THE  CALL  OF  ABRAHAM. 


Lect.  1 


II.  What  then  is  the  position  which  has  been 
accorded  to  Abraham  by  the  general  witness  of  his¬ 
tory  ?  What  was  it  which  caused  his  own  nation  to 
make  their  highest  boast  of  a  descent1  from  him  ?  which 
caused  them  to  look  forward  to  the  rest  in  his  bosom2 
as  the  fitting  repose  of  wearied  souls  that  have  escaped 
from  the  toil  of  their  earthly  pilgrimage  ? 

The  answer  may  best  be  given  by  considering  the 
two  names  by  which  he  is  known  in  the  traditions 
of  the  East,  and  which,  though  they  only  occur  once 
or  twice  in  Scripture,  yet  so  well  correspond  to  its 
whole  representation  of  Abraham,  that  they  may  fitly 
be  taken  as  his  distinguishing  characteristics. 

1.  First,  he  is  “  the  Friend  of  God.”  “  El-Khalil- Allah,” 
The  Friend  or?  as  he  1S  more  usually  called,  “  El-Khalil,”  sim- 
°f  God.  piy?  «  the  Friend,” 3  is  a  title  which  has  in  Mus¬ 
sulman  countries  superseded  altogether  his  own  proper 
name.  In  many  ways  it  has  a  peculiar  significance. 
It  is,  in  its  most  general  aspect,  an  illustration  of  the 
difference  which  has  been  well  remarked  between  the 
early  beginnings  of  Jewish  history  and  those  of  any 
other  ancient  nation.  Grant  to  the  uttermost  the  un¬ 
certain,  shadowy,  fragmentary  character  of  these  prim¬ 
itive  records,  yet  there  is  one  point  brought  out 


1  It  was  a  tradition  that  the  Hebrew 
letters  were  given  by  him ;  and  that 
Alepli  stood  first  as  being  the  first  let¬ 
ter  of  his  name.  (Suidas  in  voce 
“  Abraham.”)  Artapanus  (in  Eus. 
Prcep.  ix.  18)  derives  the  name  “  He¬ 
brew  ”  from  that  of  Abraham. 

2  See  Lightfoot  on  Luke  xvi.  22. 

3  See  D’Herbelot  (“Abraham”), 
for  its  precise  import.  The  name  of 
Abraham  was  interpreted  by  Apol¬ 
lonius  Melon  (Eus.  Prcep.  ix.  19)  as 


“Friend  of  the  Father.”  In  Scrip¬ 
ture  it  occurs  only  in  James  ii.  23  ; 
“  He  was  called  the  friend  of  God  :  ” 
and  more  doubtfully  in  Isaiah  xli.  8  ; 
“  Jacob  whom  I  have  chosen,  the  seed 
“  of  Abraham  my  friend  :  ”  2  Chron. 
xx.  7 ;  “  The  seed  of  Abraham  my 
“friend.”  In  Clem.  Rom.  ( Ep .  i.  10) 
he  is  called  simply  “  the  friend,” 
’ABpaup.  6  (p'tXot;  TrpoaayopevBetg.  In  Gen. 
xviii.  17,  Philo  (i.  40)  reads  “friend” 
for  “  servant.” 


Lect.  I. 


HIS  RELIGIOUS  ASPECT. 


15 


clearly  and  distinctly.  The  ancestor  of  the  Chosen 
People  is  not,  as  in  the  legends  of  Greece  and  Rome, 
or  even  of  Germany,  a  god  or  a  demi-god,  or  the  son 
of  a  god :  he  is,  as  we  have  just  observed,  a  mere 
man,  a  chief,  such  as  those  to  whom  these  records  were 
first  presented  must  have  constantly  seen  with  their 
own  eyes.  The  interval 1  between  the  human  and  the 
divine  is  never  confounded.  Close  as  are  the  com¬ 
munications  with  Deity,  yet  the  Divine  Essence  is 
always  veiled,  the  man  is  never  absorbed  into  it. 
Abraham  is  “the  Friend,”  but  he  is  nothing  more. 
He  is  nothing  more ;  but  he  is  nothing  less.  He  is 
“the  Friend  of  God.”  The  title  includes  a  double 
meaning.  He  is  “  beloved  of  God.”  “  Fear  not,  Abram, 
“I  am  thy  shield  and  thy  exceeding  great  reward.” 
He  was  “  chosen  ” 2  by  God  :  he  was  “  called  ” 3  The  call  of 
by  God.  Although  in  the  word  “  ecclesia,”  in  God’ 
its  religious  sense,  the  etymological  meaning,  as  “  of  an 
assembly  called  forth  by  the  heraldf  is  lost  in  the  gen¬ 
eral  idea  of  “  a  congregation,”  yet  this  original  mean¬ 
ing  gives  a  fitness  to  the  consideration  that  he  who 
was  the  first  in  the  succession  of  the  “  ecclesia,”  or 
“  church,”  was  so  by  virtue  of  what  is  known  in  all 
subsequent  history  as  his  “  call  ”  The  word  itself,  as 
applied  to  the  summons  which  led  the  Patriarch  forth, 
rarely  occurs  in  the  sacred  writers.  But  it  gathers 
up  in  a  short  compass  the  chief  meaning  of  his  first 
appearance.  In  him  was  exemplified  the  fundamental 
truth  of  all  religion,  that  God  has  not  deserted  the 

1  This  is  well  brought  out  in  Dean  2  Neh.  ix.  7  :  “  Thou  didst  choose 
Milman’s  History  of  the  Jews ,  i.  23.  “  Abram.” 

Contrast  the  attempt  of  the  legends  3  Isaiah  li.  2  :  “I  called  him.” 
to  invest  Abraham  with  a  supernatu-  Heb.  xi.  8  :  “He  was  called  to  go 
ral  character.  “  out. 


16  THE  CALL  OF  ABRAHAM.  Lect.  I. 

/ 

world;  that  His  work  is  carried  on  by  His  chosen 
instruments ;  that  good  men  are  not  only  His  creat¬ 
ures  and  His  servants,  but  His  friends.  In  those 
simple  words  in  which  the  Biblical  narrative  describes 
“  the  call,”  whatever  there  is  of  truth  in  the  predes- 
tinarian  doctrine  of  Augustine  and  of  Calvin  finds  its 
earliest  expression. 

But  the  further  meaning  involved  in  the  title  of 
Abraham  indicates  the  correlative  truth,  —  not  only 
was  Abraham  beloved  by  God,  but  God  was  “  beloved 
by  him;”  not  only  was  God  the  Friend  of  Abraham, 
but  Abraham  was  66  the  friend  of  God.”  To  expand 
this  truth  is  to  see  what  was  the  religion,  the  com¬ 
munion  with  the  Supreme,  which  raised  Abraham 
above  his  fellow-men. 

The  greater  histories  of  the  Christian  Church  usu- 
Beiief  in  ally  commence  with  dissertations  on  the  state 
Go<L  of  the  heathen  world  at  the  time  of  the  birth 

of  Christ.  Something  analogous  to  this  ought,  if  it 
were  possible,  to  be  in  our  minds  in  conceiving  the 
rise  of  the  Jewish  Church  in  the  person  of  Abraham. 
But  it  would  be  of  a  totally  different  kind ;  it  would  be¬ 
long  to  the  province  rather  of  philosophy  than  of  history. 
We  must  transport  ourselves  back  to  that  primeval  time 
of  which  so  lively  a  picture  has  lately  been  furnished 1 
Worship  from  the  results  of  philological  research;  of 
heavenly  which,  in  the  European  world,  we  see  perhaps 
bodies.  the  jas£  traces  jn  Homer,  but  of  which  still  later 
memorials  were  preserved  in  the  New  World  in  the  Pe¬ 
ruvian  worship,  even  down  to  the  sixteenth  century, 
when  it  was  seen  and  elaborately  described  by  the 
first  Spanish  discoverers.2  The  objects  of  nature,  espe- 

1  Professor  Muller’s  “  Comparative  2  See  Helps’s  Spanish  Conq.  iii 
Mythology,”  in  Oxford  Essays ,  1856.  488. 


Lect.  I. 


HIS  CREED. 


17 


cially  the  heavenly  bodies,  were  then  invested  with  a 
“  glory  ”  and  a  “  freshness  ”  which  has  long  since 
“  passed  away ”  from  the  earth ;  they  seemed  to  be 
instinct  with  a  divinity,  which  exercised  an  almost 
irresistible  fascination  over  their  first  beholders.  “  The 
“  sight  of  the  sun  when  it  shined,  and  of  the  moon 
a  walking  in  brightness,” 1  was  a  temptation  as  potent 
to  them  as  to  us  it  is  inconceivable ;  “  their  heart 
“  was  secretly  enticed,  and  their  hand  kissed  their 
“  mouth.”  There  was  also  another  form  of  idolatry, 
though  less  universal  in  its  influence.  “  There  were 
“  giants  on  the  earth  in  those  days ;  ”  giants,  if  not 
actually,  yet  by  their  colossal  strength  and  awful 
majesty  :  the  Pharaohs  and  Nimrods,  whose  forms  we 
can  still  trace  on  the  monuments  of  Egypt  Worship 
and  Assyria  in  their  gigantic  proportions,  the  kings, 
mighty  hunters,  the  royal  priests,  the  deified  men. 
From  the  control  of  these  powers,  before  which  all 
meaner  men  bowed  down,  from  the  long  ancestral 
prepossessions  of  “  country  and  kindred  and  father’s 
“  house,”  the  first  worshippers  of  One  who  was  above 
all  alike  had  painfully  to  disentangle  themselves.  It 
is  true  that  Abraham  hardly  appears  before  us  as  a 
prophet2  or  teacher  of  any  new  religion.  As3  the 


1  Job  xxxi.  26,  27. 

2  He  is  so  called  incidentally,  Gen. 
xx.  7,  and  perhaps  Ps.  cv.  15.  He  is 
also  “  a  prophet  ”  (Nabi)  in  the  Mus¬ 
sulman  traditions. 

3  I  cannot  forbear,  in  illustration 
of  these  statements,  to  refer  to  a  far 
more  forcible  and  exact  exposition 
of  it  which  appeared  (since  the  de¬ 
livery  of  this  Lecture)  in  an  Essay  on 
Semitic  Monotheism  (in  The  Times 
of  April  14  and  15,  1860)  by  Pro- 

3 


fessor  Max  Muller.  “  How  is  the  fact 
“  to  be  explained  that  the  three  great 
“  religions  of  the  world  in  which  the 
“  Unity  of  the  Deity  forms  the  key- 
“  note  are  of  Semitic  origin  ?  .  .  .  . 
“  Mohammedanism,  no  doubt,  is  a 
“  Semitic  religion ;  and  its  very  cor 
“  is  Monotheism.  But  did  Mohammed 
“  invent  Monotheism  ?  Did  he  invent 
“  even  a  new  name  of  God  ?  Not  at 
“  all.  .  .  .  And  how  is  it  with  Chris- 
“  tianity  ?  Did  Christ  come  to  preach 


IS 


THE  CALL  OF  ABRAHAM. 


Lect.  I. 


Scripture  represents  him,  it  is  rather  as  if  he  was 
possessed  of  the  truth  himself,  than  as  if  he  had  any 
call  to  proclaim  it  to  others.  His  life  is  his  creed ; 
Abraham  his  migration  is  his  mission.  But  we  can  hardly 

the  first  0  " 

teacher  of  doubt  that  here  the  legendary  tales  till  up, 
the  Unity  .  .  &  J  1  7 

of  God.  ‘  though  in  their  own  fantastic  way,  what  the 
Biblical  account  dimly  implies.  He  was,  in  practice, 
the  Friend  of  God,  in  the  noblest  of  all  senses  of 
the  word ;  the  Friend  who  stood  fast  when  others 
tell  away.  He  is  the  first  distinct  historical  witness, 
at  least  for  his  own  race  and  country,  to  Theism  — 
to  Monotheism,  to  the  unity  of  the  Lord  and  Ruler 
of  all  against  the  primeval  idolatries,  the  natural  relig¬ 
ion  of  the  ancient  world.  It  may  be  an  empty  fable 
that  Terah  was  a  maker  of  idols,  and  that  Abraham 


“  faith  in  a  new  God  ?  Did  He  or 
“  His  disciples  invent  a  new  name 
“  of  God  ?  No.  Christ  came  not  to 
“  destroy,  but  to  fulfil,  and  the  God 
‘  whom  He  preached  was  the  God  of 
Abraham.  And  who  is  the  God  of 
“  Jeremiah,  of  Elijah,  and  of  Moses  ? 
u  We  answer  again,  ‘  the  God  of  Abra- 
“  ham/  Thus  the  faith  in  the  One 
“  Living  God,  which  seemed  to  re- 
“  quire  the  admission  of  a  monotheistic 
“  instinct,  grafted  in  every  member 
“  of  the  Semitic  family,  is  traced  back 
“  to  one  man,  to  him,  ‘  in  whom  all  the 
“  families  of  the  earth  shall  be  blessed/ 
“  —  And  if  from  our  earliest  childhood 
“  we  have  looked  upon  Abraham,  the 
“  Friend  of  God,  with  love  and  ven- 
“  eration  .  .  .  his  venerable  figure 
“  will  assume  still  more  majestic  pro- 
“  portions,  when  we  see  in  him  the 
“  life-spring  of  that  faith  which  was 
“  to  unite  all  the  nations  of  the  earth, 
“  and  the  author  of  that  blessing  which 


“  was  to  come  on  the  Gentiles  through 
“  Jesus  Christ.  And  if  we  are  asked 
“  how  this  one  Abraham  passed 
“  through  the  denial  of  all  other 
“  Gods,  to  the  knowledge  of  the  one 
“  God,  we  are  content  to  answer  that 
“  it  was  by  a  special  divine  revelation 
“  .  .  .  .  granted  to  that  one  man,  and 
“  handed  down  by  him  to  Jews,  Chris- 
“  tians,  and  Mohammedans  ...  to  all 
“  who  believe  in  the  God  of  Abraham. 
“ .  .  .  We  want  to  know  more  of  that 
“  man  than  we  do;  but  even  with  the 
“  little  we  know  of  him,  he  stands  be- 
“  fore  us  as  a  figure  second  only  to  One 
“  in  the  whole  history  of  the  world/’ 

“  Abraham,”  says  Baron  Bunsen, 
“is  the  Zoroaster  of  the  Semitic  race; 
“  but  he  is  more  than  the  Zoroaster, 
“  in  proportion  as  his  sense  of  the 
“  divine  was  more  spiritual,  and  more 
“  free  from  the  philosophy  of  nature, 
“  and  the  adoration  of  the  visible 
“  world.”  —  Bibelwerk ,  ii.  88. 


Llct.  I. 


HIS  CREED. 


19 


was  cast  by  Nimrod  into  a  burning  fiery  furnace  for 
refusing  to  worship  him.  But  even  in  the  Book  of 
Joshua  we  read  that  the  original  fathers  of  the  Jew¬ 
ish  race  who  dwelt  beyond  the  Euphrates  served 
other1  gods,  and  the  deliverance  implied  in  the  call 
indicates  something  more  than  a  mere  change  of  state 
and  place.2  We  may  be  forgiven  if  we  supply  the 
void  by  a  well-known  legend,  which  has  left  its  traces 
in  almost  every  traditional 3  account  of  Abraham.  The 
scene  is  sometimes  laid  in  Ur,  sometimes  in  the  cele¬ 
brated  hill  above  Damascus.4  The  story  is  best  told 
in  the  words  of  the  Koran.  “  When  night  overshcidoived 
“  him,  he  saw  a  star ,  and  said ,  This  is  my  Lord!  Bat 
“  ivhen  it  set ,  he  said ,  4 1  like  not  those  that  set !  And 
“  when  he  saw  the  moon  rising ,  he  said ,  ‘  This  is  my  Lord! 
“  But  when  the  moon  set ,  he  ansivered ,  ‘  Verily  if  my  Lord 
“  direct  me  not  in  the  right  way ,  L  shall  be  as  one  of  those 
“  who  err!  And  when  he  saiv  the  sun  rising ,  he  said, 
“  ‘  This  is  my  Lord.  This  is  greater  than  the  star  or 
“  moon!  But  when  the  sun  went  doivn ,  he  said ,  ‘  0  my 
“people,  L  am  clear  of  these  things.  L  turn  my  face  to 
“  Him  ivho  hath  made  the  heaven  and  the  earth!  ”  It  is 
an  illustration  of  this  ancient  legend  that  many  ages 
afterwards  another  dweller  in  Ur  of  the  Chaldees,  that 
Syrian  saint  of  whom  I  have  before  spoken,  Ephrem 
of  Edessa,  relates5  that  once  coming  out  of  the  city 

very  early  in  the  morning  with  two  of  his  compan- 

» 


1  Joshua  xxiv.  2,  14.  One  inter¬ 
pretation  of  “  Ur  ”  (light)  is  that  it 
was  the  seat  of  the  sun-worship :  as 
it  certainly  was  in  the  fourth  century. 
Bayer,  4. 

2  See  Judith,  v.  7,  8,  a  statement 
independent  of  Genesis. 

3  Philo,  ii.  12.  Josephus,  Ant.  i.  7, 


1 ;  Suidas  (in  voce  “  Abraham  ”)  ;  the 
Talmud  and  Midrash  (where  it  is 
founded  on  Isa.  xli.  2).  See  Beer’s 
Leben  Abrahams ,  102.  Koran,  vi. 
74-82. 

4  Ibn  Batuta,  231. 

5  Tillemont,  S.  Ephrem ,  ch.  12. 


20 


THE  CALL  OF  ABRAHAM. 


Lect.  I. 


ions,  lie  gazed  upon  the  heavens,  spangled  with  bright 
stars.  Their  brilliancy  struck  him  as  they  had  struck 
the  Chaldsean  shepherd  of  old ;  and  he  said,  “  If  the 
“  brightness  of  these  stars  be  so  dazzling,  how  will  the 
“  saints  shine  when  Christ  shall  come  in  glory  !  ”  What 
a  world  of  new  hopes,  new  fears,  new  prospects,  lies 
between  the  reflection  of  the  primitive  patriarch  and 
the  reflection  of  the  Christian  saint. 

2.  This  leads  us  to  the  second  name  by  which  Abra- 
TheFather  ham  is  known,  “  The  Father  of  the  Faithful.”1 
Faithful;  Two  points  are  involved  in  this  name  also. 
First,  he  was  himself  “  the  Faithful.”  In  him  was 
most  distinctly  manifested  the  gift  of  “  faith.”  In  him, 
long,  long  before  Luther,  long  before  Paul,  was  it  pro¬ 
claimed  in  a  sense  far  more  universal  and  clear  than 
the  “  paradox  ”  of  the  Reformer,  not  less  clear  and 
His  faith,  universal  than  the  preaching  of  the  Apostle, 
that  “man  is  justified  by  faith.”  “Abraham  believed  in 
“  the  Lord  and  He  counted  it  to  him  for  righteousness .” 2 
Powerful  as  is  the  effect  of  these  words  when  we 
read  them  in  their  first  untarnished  freshness,  they 
gain  immensely  in  their  original  language,  to  which 
neither  Greek  nor  German,  much  less  Latin  or  English, 
can  furnish  any  full  equivalent.  “He  w^as  supported, 
“he  was  built  up,  he  reposed  as  a  child  in  its  moth¬ 
er’s  arms”  (such  seems  the  force  of  the  Hebrew 
word 3)  in  the  strength  of  God ;  in  God  whom  he  did 
not  see,  more  than  in  the  giant  empires  of  earth,  and 
the  bright  lights  of  heaven,  or  the  claims  of  tribe  and 
kindred,  which  were  always  before  him.  “  It  was  count- 
“ed  to  him  for  righteousness.”  It  “was  counted  to 
“him,”  and  his  history  seals  and  ratifies  the  result. 


1  Rom.  iv.  12. 

2  Gen  xv.  6. 


3  See  Gesenius,  Lexicon,  72 


Lect.  I. 


HIS  FAITH. 


21 


His  faith,  as  we  have  seen,  transpires  not  in  any  out> 
ward  profession  of  faith,  but  precisely  in  that  which 
far  more  nearly  concerns  him  and  every  one  of  us, 
in  his  prayers,  in  his  actions,  in  the  righteousness,  the 
“justice”  (if  one  may  again  so  draw  out  the  sense  of 
the  Hebrew  word1),  the  “uprightness”  the  moral  “ ele¬ 
vation  ”  of  soul  and  spirit  which  sent  him  on  his  way 
straightforward,  without  turning  to  the  right  hand  or 
to  the  left.  His  belief,  vague,  it  may  be,  indefinite 
and  scanty,  even  in  the  most  elementary  truths  of 
religion,  is  in  the  Scriptures  implied  rather  than  stated. 
It  is  in  him  simply  “  the  evidence  of  things  not  seen,” 
“  the  hope  against  hope.”  His  faith,  in  the  literal 
sense  of  the  word,  is  known  to  us  only  through  “  his 
works.”  He  and  his  descendants  are  blessed,  not 
as  in  the  Koran,  because  of  his  adoption  of  the 
first  article  of  the  creed  of  Islam,  but  because 
he  had  “  obeyed  the  voice  of  the  Lord,  and  kept 
“  His  charge ,  His  commandments ,  His  statutes ,  and  His 
“  laws.”  2 

Such  was  the  faith  of  the  First  Believer:  in  how 
many  ways,  an  example,  a  consolation,  a  study,  His  univer- 

.  °  .  sal  charac- 

to  his  latest  descendants.  And  this  prepares  ter. 
us  for  observing  that  he  was  not  only  “  faithful,”  but 
“  the  Father  of  the  Faithful.”  In  modern  ages  of  the 
history  of  the  Church  it  has  too  often  happened  that 
the  doctrine  of  “  faith  ”  has  had  a  narrowing  effect  on 
the  conscience  and  feelings  of  those  who  have  strongly 
embraced  it.  It  was  far  otherwise  with  S.  Paul,  to 
whom  it  was  almost  synonymous  with  the  admission 
of  the  Gentiles.  It  was  far  otherwise  with  its  first 
exemplification  in  the  life  of  the  Patriarch  Abraham. 
His  very  name  implies  this  universal  mission.  “  The 

1  See  Gesenius,  Lexicon ,  854.  2  Gen.  xxvi.  5  ;  xviii.  19. 


22 


THE  CALL  OF  ABRAHAM. 


Lect.  I. 


Father”1  (Abba);  “ The  lofty  Father”  (Ab-ram);  “The 
Father  of  multitudes”  (Ab-raham2);  the  venerable 
parent,  surveying,  as  if  from  that  lofty  eminence,  the 
countless  progeny  who  should  look  up  to  him  as  their 
spiritual  ancestor.  He  was,  first,  the  Father  of  the 
Chosen  People,  the  people  who,  by  reason  of  their 
faith,  though  in  one  sense  the  narrowest  of  all  ancient 
nations,  yet  were  also  the  widest  in  their  diffusion 
and  dispersion,  —  the  only  people,  that,  by  virtue  of 
an  invisible  bond,  maintained  their  national  union  in 
spite  of  local  difference  and  division.  But  he  was 
much  more  than  the  Father  of  the  Chosen  People. 
It  is  not  a  mere  allegory  or  accidental  application  of 
separate  texts,  that  justifies  S.  Paul’s  appeal  to  the 
case  of  Abraham  as  including  within  itself  the  faith 
of  the  whole  Gentile  world.  His  position,  as  repre¬ 
sented  to  us  in  the  original  records,  is  of  itself  far 
wider  than  that  of  any  merely  Jewish  saint  or  national 
hero ;  and  he  is,  on  that  ground  alone,  the  fitting  im¬ 
age  to  meet  us  at  the  outset  of  the  history  of  the 
Church.  He,  the  founder  of  the  Jewish  race,  was  yet, 
by  the  confession  of  their  own  annals,  not  a  Jew,  nor 
the  father  exclusively  of  Jews.  He  was  “  the  He¬ 
brew,”  to  whom,  both  in  the  Biblical  record 3  and  their 
own  traditions,  the  Arabian  no  less  than  the  Israelite 
tribes  look  back  as  to  their  first  ancestor.  The  scene 
of  his  life,  as  of  the  Patriarchs  generally,  breathes  a 
larger  atmosphere  than  the  contracted  limits  of  Pal¬ 
estine, —  the  free  air  of  the  plains  of  Mesopotamia 

1  According  to  the  Persian  tradi-  (hamon  =  multitude,  as  of  the  drops 

tions  his  name,  before  his  conversion,  of  rain,  the  swelling  of  springs,  the 
was  Zerwan,  “  the  wealthy.”  Hyde,  voice  of  singers).  Gesenius,  Lexicon , 
Rel.  Pers.  77.  281. 

2  An  abbreviation  of  rdb-hamon  3  Gen.  xvi.  15 ;  xxv.  1-6. 


Lect.  I. 


HIS  UNIVERSAL  CHARACTER. 


23 


and  the  desert,  —  the  neighborhood  of  the  vast  shapes 
of  the  Babylonian  monarchy  on  one  side,  and  of 
Egypt  on  the  other.  He  is  not  an  ecclesiastic,  not 
an  ascetic,  not  even  a  learned  sage,  but  a  chief,  a 
shepherd,  a  warrior,  full  of  all  the  affections  and  in¬ 
terests  of  family  and  household,  and  wealth  and  power, 
and  for  this  very  reason  the  first  true  type  of  the 
religious  man,  the  first  representative  of  the  whole 
Church  of  God. 

This  universality  of  Abraham’s  faith,  —  this  eleva¬ 
tion,  this  multitudinousness  of  the  Patriarchal,  paternal 
character,  which  his  name  involves,  has  also  found 
a  response  in  those  later  traditions  and  feelings  of 
which  I  have  before  spoken.  When  Mahomet 1  attacks 
the  idolatry  of  the  Arabs,  he  justifies  himself  by  argu¬ 
ing,  almost  in  the  language  of  S.  Paul,  that  the  faith 
which  he  proclaimed  in  One  Supreme  God  was  no  new 
belief,  but  was  identical  with  the  ancient  religion  of 
their  first  father  Abraham.  When  the  Emperor  Alex¬ 
ander  Severus  placed  in  the  chapel  of  his  palace  the 
statues  of  the  choice  spirits  of  all  times,2  Abraham, 
rather  than  Moses,  was  selected,  as  the  centre,  doubt¬ 
less,  of  a  more  extended  circle  of  sacred  associations. 
When  the  author  of  the  “  Liberty  of  Prophesying  ” 
ventured,  before  any  other  English  divine,  to  lift  up 
his  voice  in  behalf  of  universal  religious  toleration,  he 
was  glad  to  shelter  himself  under  the  authority  of  the 
ancient  Jewish  or  Persian  apologue,  of  doubtful  origin, 
but  of  most  instructive  wisdom,  of  almost  Scriptural 
simplicity,  which  may  well  be  repeated  here  as  an 

1  Koran,  ii.  118-126;  129,  130  ;  “  tiores.”  —  Lamprid.  Alex.  Sever.  Vit. 

iii.  30,  91.  c.  20. 

2  “  Optimos  electos  et  animos  sane- 


24 


THE  CALL  OF  ABKAHAM. 


Lect.  1 


expression  of  the  world-wide  sympathies  which  attach 
to  the  Father  of  the  Faithful.1 

“  When  Abraham  sate  at  his  tent-door ,  according  to  his 
“  custom ,  waiting  to  entertain  strangers ,  he  espied  an  old 
“  man  stooping  and  leaning  on  his  staff  \  weary  with  age  and 
“  travel ,  coming  towards  him ,  who  was  an  hundred  years  of 
“  age .  He  received  him  kindly ,  washed  his  feet ,  provided  sup- 
“  per,  caused  him  to  sit  down,  bid  observing  that  the  old  man 
“  ate  and  prayed  not,  nor  begged  for  a  blessing  on  his  meat, 
“  asked  him  why  he  did  not  worship  the  God  of  Heaven  ? 
“  The  old  man  told  him  that  he  worshipped  the  fire  only, 
“  and  acknowledged  no  other  god ;  at  which  answer  Abra- 
“  ham  grew  so  zealously  angry,  that  he  thrust  the  old  man 
“  out  of  his  tent,  and  exposed  him  to  all  the  evils  of  the 
“  night  and  an  unguarded  condition.  When  the  old  man 
“ was  gone,  God  called  to  him  and  asked  him  where  the 
“  stranger  was  ;  he  replied :  6  I  thrust  him  away ,  because  he 
“  did  not  worship  thee !  God  answered,  ‘  I  have  suffered 
“  him  these  hundred  years,  though  he  dishonored  me ;  and 
“  couldest  not  thou  endure  him  for  one  night,  when  he  gave 
“  thee  no  trouble  ?  9  Upon  this,  saith  the  story,  Abraham 
“fetched  him  back  again,  and  gave  him  hospitable  entertain- 
“  ment,  and  tvise  instruction.  Go  thou  and  do  likewise  ;  and 
“  thy  charity  will  be  rewarded  by  the  God  of  Abraham  ” 

If  we  may  trust  the  ingenious  conjecture  of  a  dis- 
The  name  tinguished  writer,2  whom  I  have  already  quoted, 
of  Eiohim.  a  more  certain  and  enduring  memorial  has 


1  The  story  and  its  origin  are  given 
in  Heber’s  Life  of  Jeremy  Taylor ,  note 
xx.  (Eden’s  edit.  vol.  i.  p.  cccvi.),  and 
in  a  letter  of  Mr.  Everett,  in  the  Life 
of  Sydney  Smith ,  14.  It  was  appar¬ 
ently  told  by  a  Jewish  prisoner  at 
Tripoli  to  the  Persian  poet  Saadi 


whilst  working  as  a  slave,  thence 
copied  by  Grotius,  thence  by  Taylor, 
thence  appropriated  by  Franklin. 

2  What  follows  has  been  added,  in 
a  condensed  form,  from  the  Essay  of 
Professor  Muller  on  Semitic  Mono¬ 
theism,  already  cited.  (See  p.  1 7.) 


Lect.  I. 


HIS  UNIVERSAL  CHARACTER. 


25 


been  preserved  of  this  side  of  Abraham’s  mission. 
The  name  by  which  the  Deity  is  known  throughout 
the  patriarchal  or  introductory  age  of  the  Jewish 
Church  is  “  Elohim,”  translated  in  the  English  version 
u  God.”  In  this  name  has  been  discovered  a  trace  of 
the  conciliatory,  comprehensive  mission  of  the  first 
Prophet  of  the  true  religion.  a  Elohim  ”  is  a  plural 
noun,  though  followed  by  a  verb  in  the  singular. 
When  “Eloah”  (God)  was  first  used  in  the  plural, 
it  could  only  have  signified,  like  any  other  plural, 
“  many  Eloahs ;  ”  and  such  a  plural  could  only  have 
been  formed  after  the  various  names  of  God  had  be¬ 
come  the  names  of  independent  deities;  that  is,  dur¬ 
ing  a  polytheistic  stage.  The  transition  from  this  into 
the  monotheistic  stage  could  be  effected  only  in  two 
ways ;  either  by  denying  altogether  the  existence  of 
the  Elohim  and  changing  them  into  devils,  —  as  was 
done  in  Persia,  —  or  by  taking  a  higher  view,  and 
looking  upon  them  as  so  many  names  invented  with 
the  honest  purpose  of  expressing  the  various  aspects 
of  the  Deity,  though  in  time  diverted  from  their  orig¬ 
inal  intention.  This  was  the  view  taken  by  Abraham. 
Whatever  the  names  of  the  Elohim  worshipped  by 
the  numerous  clans  of  his  race,  Abraham  saw  that  all 
the  Elohim  were  meant  for  God ;  and  thus  Elohim, 
comprehending  by  one  name  everything  that  ever  was 
or  ever  could  be  called  Divine,  became  the  name  by 
which  the  monotheistic  age  was  rightly  inaugurated : 
a  plural  conceived  and  construed  as  a  singular.  From 
this  point  of  view  the  Semitic  name  of  the  Deity, 
which  at  first  sounds  not  only  ungrammatical,  but 
irrational,  becomes  perfectly  clear  and  intelligible.  It 
is  at  once  the  proof  that  Monotheism  rose  on  the 
ruins  of  a  polytheistic  faith,  and  that  it  absorbed  and 


26 


THE  CALL  OF  ABRAHAM. 


Lect.  I 


acknowledged  the  better  tendencies  of  that  faith.  In 
the  true  spirit  of  the  later  Apostle  of  the  Gentiles, 
Abraham,  his  first  predecessor  and  model,  declared  the 
God  “  wThom  they  ignorantly  worshipped,”  to  be  the 
“  God  that  made  the  world,  and  all  things  therein,” 
u  the  Lord  of  heaven  and  earth,”  “  in  whom  we  live, 
“  and  move,  and  have  our  being.” 1 

Yet,  however  comprehensive  is  this  type  of  the 
The  Cove-  Patriarch’s  character,  there  is  an  exclusive- 
^,ant'  ness  also.  In  one  point  of  view,  u  he  is  the 

Circum-  #  ' 

cision.  “  Father  of  all  them  that  believe,  though  they 
“  be  not  circumcised :  ”  in  another  point  of  view  he  is 
the  Father  of  the  circumcision  only.  That  venerable 
rite,  indeed,  which  in  the  first  beginnings  of  Chris¬ 
tianity  was  regarded  only  as  a  mark  of  division  and 
narrowness,  was,  in  the  primitive  Eastern  world,  the 
sign  of  a  proud  civilization.2  It  was  not  only  a  Jew¬ 
ish,  but  an  Arabian,  a  Phoenician,  an  Egyptian  cus¬ 
tom.  As  such  it  still  lingers  in  the  Coptic  and  Abys¬ 
sinian  Churches.  How  far<  any  of  these  countries  re¬ 
ceived  it  from  Abraham,  or  Abraham  from  them,  is 
now  almost  as  difficult  to  ascertain,  as  it  is  to  dis¬ 
cern  the  original  signification  of  a  usage,  once  so 
honorable  and  so  sacred,  and  now  so  entirely  re¬ 
moved  alike  from  honor  and  from  sanctity.  But  the 
limitation,  of  wrhich,  in  a  religious  sense,  it  was  the 
symbol,  is  expressed  in  a  passage  of  the  Patriarch’s 
life,  which  stands  midway,  as  it  were,  between  his 
The  vision  wider  and  his  narrower  call.  In  the  visions3 

ftnd  the  .  _  #  #  _ 

sacrifice.  of  the  night  Abraham  is  called  forth  by  the 

/ 

1  Acts  xvii.  23-28.  3  Gen.  xv.  1.  By  Jewish  tradition 

2  See  Ezekiel  xxxii.  24-32,  with  this  scene  is  fixed  on  a  mountain  three 

Ewald’s  notes.  Compare  also  Ewald’s  miles  north  of  Banias.  Schwarz, 
Alterthiimer ,  100.  302. 


Lect.  I. 


ITS  RELATION  TO  THE  JEWISH  CHURCH. 


27 


Divine  voice,  from  the  curtains  of  the  tent,  under  the 
open  sky.  He  is  told  to  look  towards  heaven,  the 
clear  bright  Eastern  heaven,  glittering  with  innumer¬ 
able  stars,  those  stars  which  all  tradition,  as  we  have 
seen,  has  so  naturally  and  so  closely  connected  with 
the  education  and  conversion  of  Abraham ;  the  stars 
which  have  in  all  times  taught  unearthly  wisdom  and 
vastness  of  spiritual  ideas  to  the  mind  of  man.  66  Look 
“  toward  heaven,  and  tell  the  stars,  if  thou  be  able  to 
“  number  them.  So  shall  thy  seed  he.”  This  was,  if 
taken  in  its  fullest  sense,  that  wide,  incalculable,  inter¬ 
minable  view  of  all  nations,  and  kindreds,  and  peoples, 
and  tongues  —  each  star  differing  from  the  other  star 
in  glory  —  of  which  we  have  already  spoken.  But 
the  vision  was  not  ended.  He  was  bidden  to  prepare 
as  for  the  peculiar  forms  of  sacrifice  which,  it  is  said,1 
for  centuries  afterwards,  in  his  own  country,  were  used 
to  sanction  a  treaty  or  covenant.  The  birds,  and  the 
fragments  of  the  heifer  and  the  goat,  were  parted,  so 
as  to  leave  a  space  for  the  contracting  parties  to  pass 
between ;  and  the  day  began  to  decline,  and  the  birds 
of  prey,  of  evil  omen,  hovered  like  a  cloud  over  the 
carcasses ;  and  at  last  the  sun  went  down,  and  the 
heavens,  so  bright  and  clear  on  the  preceding  night, 
were  overcast ;  and  “  a  deep  sleep  fell  upon  Abraham, 
66  and  lo !  a  horror  of  great  darkness  fell  upon  him.” 
And  in  that  thick  darkness  a  light,  as  of  a  blazing 
fire,  enveloped  with  the  smoke  as  of  a  furnace,  passed 
through  the  open  space,  and  the  covenant,  the  first 
covenant,  “  the  Old  Testament,”  was  concluded  be¬ 
tween  God  and  man.  Taking  these  figures  as  they 
are  thus  shadowed  forth,  and  in  combination  with  the 

1  See  Von  Bohlen’s  note  on  Gen.  scene  see  Koran ,  ii.  262,  in  Lane’s 
xv.  10.  For  the  amplification  of  the  Selections ,  153. 


28  THE  CALL  OF  ABRAHAM.  Lect.  I. 

words  which  followed,  they  truly  express  the  peculiar 
“  conditions,”  to  use  the  modern  phrase,  under  which 
the  history  of  the  Chosen  People  was  to  be  unfolded 
from  its  brighter  and  from  its  darker  side.  Darkness 
and  light  are  mingled  together ;  the  bright  heavens 
of  yesterday  overclouded  by  the  horror  of  great  dark¬ 
ness  to-day;  wheresoever  the  carcasses  of  the  victims 
lie,  the  ravenous  eagles  are  gathered  together,  and 
with  difficulty  scared  away  by  the  watchful  protector ; 
the  light,  burning  in  the  midst  of  the  smoke  as  it 
sweeps  through  the  narrow  pathway,  is  the  same  image 
that  we  shall  meet  again  and  again  throughout  the 
history  of  the  Older,  and  of  the  New  covenant  also : 
the  bush  burning  but  not  consumed ;  the  pillar  at 
once  of  cloud  and  of  fire ;  the  children  in  the  midst 
of  the  furnace,  yet  without  hurt ;  the  remnant  pre¬ 
served,  though  cut  down  to  the  root :  exile  and  bond¬ 
age,  yet  constant  deliverance;  a  narrow  home,  yet  a 
vast  dominion ; 1  the  perverse,  wayward,  degraded  peo¬ 
ple,  yet  the  countrymen  and  the  progenitors,  after 
the  flesh,  of  One  in  whom  was  brought  to  the  high¬ 
est  fulfilment  their  own  union  of  suffering  and  of 
triumph,  the  thick  darkness  of  the  smoking  furnace, 
the  burning  and  the  shining  light.2  This  is  the  mixed 
prospect  of  the  History  of  the  Jewish  Church ;  this  is 
the  mixed  prospect,  in  its  widest  sense,  of  all  Eccle¬ 
siastical  History. 


1  Gen.  xv.  18-21.  The  “  river  of 
Egypt”  (here  only)  is  the  Nile.  It 
is  inserted,  evidently,  as  the  extreme 
western  limit  of  Jewish  thought  and 
dominion. 

2  A  fine  passage,  which  unites  the 
thought  of  the  vision  of  Gen.  xv.  12, 
with  the  universal  prayer  of  Abraham 


in  Gen.  xviii.  23,  occurs  in  the  le¬ 
gends  (Beer’s  Leben  Abrahams,  88), 
where,  after  the  overthrow  of  Jeru¬ 
salem,  the  figure  of  Abraham  emerges 
from  the  ruins  to  plead  for  the 
repentance  and  restoration  of  his 
people. 


Lect.  II. 


ABRAHAM  AND  ISAAC. 


29 


LECTURE  II. 

ABRAHAM  AND  ISAAC. 


It  is  an  advantage  of  visiting  a  country  once  civil¬ 
ized  but  since  fallen  back  into  barbarism,  that  The  first 
its  present  aspect  more  nearly  reproduces  to  us  ^atnhc® 
the  appearance  which  it  wore  to  its  earliest  Holy  Land 
inhabitants,  than  had  we  seen  it  in  the  height  of  its 
splendor.  Delphi  and  My  cense,  in  their  modern  deso¬ 
lation,  are  far  more  like  what  they  were  as  they  burst 
upon  the  eyes  of  the  first  Grecian  settlers,  than  at 
the  time  when  they  were  covered  by  a  mass  of  tem¬ 
ples  and  palaces.  Palestine,  in  like  manner,  must  ex¬ 
hibit  at  the  present  day  a  picture  more  nearly  re¬ 
sembling  the  country  as  it  was  seen  in  the  days  of 
the  Patriarchs,  than  would  have  been  seen  by  David, 
or  even  by  Joshua.  Doubtless  many  of  the  hills 
which  are  now  bare  were  then  covered  with  forest ; 
and  the  torrent  beds  which  are  now  dry  throughout 
the  year  were,  at  least  in  the  winter,  foaming  streams. 
But,  as  far  as  we  can  trust  the  scanty  notices,  the 
land  must  have  been  in  one  important  respect  much 
what  it  is  now.  It  is  everywhere  intimated  that  its 
population  was  thinly  scattered  over  its  broken  surface 
of  hill  and  valley.  Here  and  there  a  wandering  shep¬ 
herd,  as  now,  must  have  been  driving  his  sheep  over 
the  mountains.  The  smoke  of  some  worship,  now  ex¬ 
tinct  for  ages,  may  have  been  seen  going  up  from  the 


30 


ABRAHAM  AND  ISAAC. 


lect.  n. 


rough,  upright  stones,  which,  like  those  of  Stonehenge 
or  Abury,  in  our  own  country,  have  survived  every  form 
of  civilized  buildings,  and  remain  to  this  day  standing 
on  the  sea-coast  plain  of  Phoenicia.  Groups  of  wor¬ 
shippers  must  have  been  gathered  from  time  to  time 
on  some  of  the  many  mountain  heights,  or  under  some 
of  the  dark  clumps  of  ilex;  “For  the  Canaanite  wTas 
“  then  in  the  land.”  But  the  abodes  of  settled  life 
are  described  as  confined  to  two  spots :  one,  the  oldest 
city  in  Palestine,  the  city  of  Arba,  or  the  Four  Giants, 
as  it  was  called,  in  the  rich  vale  of  Hebron ;  the  other, 
“  the  circle  ”  of  the  five  cities  in  the  vale  of  Jordan. 
These  were  the  earliest  representatives  of  the  civil¬ 
ization  of  Canaan ;  the  Perizzites,  or,  as  they  were 
usually  called,  “  the  Hittites,”  the  dwellers  in  the 
open  villages,  who  gave  their  name  to  the  whole 
country ;  so  much  so,  that  the  children  of  Heth  are 
called  “  the  children  of  the  land,”  and  the  land  itself 
was  known  both  on  Egyptian  and  Assyrian  monu¬ 
ments  as  the  land  of  “  Heth.” 1  Mingled  with  these, 
on  the  mountain-tops,  as  their  name  implies,  were2 
the  warlike  Amorite  chiefs,  Mamre  and  his  two  broth¬ 
ers.  Along  the  southern  coast,  and  the  undulating 
land  called  “  the  south  country,”  between  Palestine 
and  the  desert,  were  the  ancient  predecessors  of  the 
Philistines,  probably  the  Avites;  not,  like  their  future 
conquerors,  a  maritime  people  of  fortified  cities,  but  a 
pastoral,  nomadic  race,  though  under  a  ruler  entitled 
“king.”  On  the  east  of  the  Jordan,  round  the  sanc¬ 
tuary  of  the  Horned  Ashtaroth,  and  southward  as  far 
as  the  Dead  Sea,  were  remnants  of  the  gigantic  abo¬ 
riginal  tribes,  not  yet  ejected  by  the  encroachments 

1  Gen.  xxiii.  7.  See  Ewald,  i.  31 7.  to  in  war,  as  the  Hittites  (xxiii.  7) 

2  Gen.  xiv.  13.  They  are  applied  in  peace. 


Lect.  II. 


THE  HALTING-PLACES. 


31 


of  Edom,  Ammon,  or  Moab,  —  the  Horites,  dwellers  in 
the  caves  of  the  distant  Petra,  the  Emim  and  Zam- 
zummim  on  the  east  of  the  Jordan,  and  the  Rephaim,1 
whose  name  long  lingered  in  the  memory  of  the 
later  inhabitants,  and  was  used  to  describe  the  shades 
of  the  world  beyond  the  grave. 

I.  Such  must  have  been  the  general  outline  of  Pal¬ 
estine  when  Abraham  “ passed  over”  from  Damascus, 
and  “  passed  through  the  land.”  Let  us  briefly  Halting_ 
note  his  halting-places,  as  he  roves,  almost  at  places- 
will,  through  the  unknown  country  to  which  we  are 
specially  invited  by  the  Sacred  narrative,  and  also  by 
the  account  of  the  Patriarchal  wanderings  in  the  speech2 
of  S.  Stephen,  which  gives  us  a  warrant,  even  from  a 
higher  point  of  view,  for  touching  on  these  rapid 
transitions  from  place  to  place.  They  bring  before  us 
the  point  often  forgotten,  which  that  great  precursor 
of  S.  Paul  was  specially  endeavoring  to  impress  upon 
his  hearers,  that  the  migration  was  still  going  on: 
that  the  Patriarch  “  had  no  inheritance  in  the  land, 
“no,  not  so  much  as  to  set  his  foot  on.”  Fixed 
locality  was  to  form  no  essential  part  of  the  true 
religion.  Abraham  was  still  the  first  Pilgrim,  the  first 
Discoverer;  “not  knowing  whither  he  went.”3  The 
words  which  Reuchlin  used  to  Melanchthon  leaving 
his  father’s  home  were  directly  and  without  effort 
taken  from  the  call  to  Abraham,  to  go  out  “  from  his 
“  country  and  from  his  kindred  and  from  his  father’s 
“  house.”  The  figures  which  we  thus  employ,  in  prose 
and  poetry,  in  allegory  and  sermon,  are  the  direct 
bequest  of  the  Patriarchal  pastoral  age.  In  the  sight 

]  Gen.  xiv.  5-7;  Deut.  ii.  10-12,  2  Acts  vii.  2-16. 

20-23.  See  Lecture  IX.  For  the  3  Heb.  xi.  8. 

Rephaim  see  Gesenius  (in  voce). 


32 


ABRAHAM  AND  ISAAC. 


Lect.  II 


of  that  primitive  time  the  symbols  and  realities,  which 
we  now  regard  as  separate  from  each  other,  were 
blended  in  one.  The  curtain  of  the  picture  of  life,  if 
I  may  use  the  expression  of  the  Greek  artist,  was  to 
'Lem  the  picture  itself. 

1.  Look  at  the  Patriarchal  wanderings  in  this  light, 
shechem.  and  it  will  not  be  thought  misspent  time  to 
dwell  for  a  short  space  on  the  successive  stages  of 
their  advance.  The  first  was  “  the  place,”  as  it  is 
called,  of  Shechem ;  then,  as  it  would  seem,  only 
marked  by  the  terebinths 1  of  Moreh.  It  is  the 
earliest  instance  of  these  primitive  wanderers  pitching 
their  tents,  for  shelter  against  wind  or  rain,  under 
the  shade  of  some  spreading  tree.  As  a  rock  or 
a  palm-grove  in  the  desert,  so  in  Palestine  itself  was 
the  isolated  terebinth  or  ilex,  the  most  massive  and 
majestic  of  its  native  trees,  and  therefore  legitimately, 
though  not  quite  correctly,  rendered  by  the  English 
parallel  of  66  the  oak.”  The  oak  of  Moreh,  like  that 
of  Mamre,  to  which  we  shall  presently  come,  probably 
derived  its  name  from  some  ancient  chief,  and  was 
perhaps  already  regarded  as  in  some  measure  sacred. 
Here,  doubtless,  by  the  side  of  the  gushing  streams 
of  the  vale  of  Shechem,  the  first  encampment  was 
described  to  have  been  made,  and  the  altar  of  the 
earliest  holy  place  in  the  Holy  Land  to  have  been 
consecrated.  Even  the  oak  remained  for  many  cen¬ 
turies  the  object  of  national  reverence.  The  sanctity 
of  the  place  lasts  even  to  this  day. 

2.  The  second  halt  was  a  day’s  journey  farther 
Bethel.  south,  on  the  central  ridge  of  Palestine,  at 
Bethel;  then  doubtless  only  known,  if  known  at  all, 
by  its  ancient  name  of  Luz;  and  to  this  same  spot 

1  Gen.  xii.  6.  See  Sinai  and  Palestine ,  142,  235. 


Lect.  II. 


THE  HALTING-PLACES. 


33 


Abraham  returned  after  the  journey  from  Egypt,  of 
which  we  will  presently  speak  more  at  length.  This 
was  more  than  a  halting-place ;  it  is  represented  as 
the  turning  point  of  his  life.  In  the*  philosophical 
and  religious  traditions  of  all  countries  there  is  often 
described  a  separation  as  between  two  parting  roads, 
a  divortium ,  or  “watershed,”  as  the  Romans  called  it, 
where  those  who  have  been  companions  up  to  a  cer¬ 
tain  point  are  thenceforth  severed  asunder.  In  Greek 
teaching  the  choice  is  described,  through  the  well- 
known  fable  of  Hercules,  between  the  rugged  path  of 
Virtue  and  the  easy  descent  of  Pleasure.  In  Mussul¬ 
man  legends,  Mahomet  stands  on  the  mountain  above 
Damascus,  and,  gazing  on  the  glorious  view,  turns 
away  from  it  with  the  words,  “  Man  has  but  one  para- 
“  dise,  and  mine  is  fixed  elsewhere.”  Often,  too,  in 
the  lives  and  conversions  of  good  men  in  later  times, 
shall  we  see  this  same  necessity  of  selection  brought 
before  us  in  the  spiritual  world.  Here  it  is  pre¬ 
sented  to  us  in  one  of  those  instances  which  I  just 
noticed,  in  which  the  spiritual  lesson  and  the  out¬ 
ward  image  are  so  blended  together  as  to  be  indis¬ 
tinguishable.  The  two  emigrants  from  Mesopotamia 
had  now  swelled  into  two  powerful  tribes,  and  the 
herdsmen  of  Abraham  and  Lot  strove  together,  and 
the  first  controversy ,  the  first  primeval  pastoral  con¬ 
troversy,  divided  the  Patriarchal  Church.  “  Let  there 
“be  no  strife,  I  pray  thee”  (so  the  Father  of  the 
Faithful  replied  in  language  which  might  well  ex¬ 
tend  beyond  the  strife  of  herdsmen  and  shepherds,  to 
the  strife  of  “  pastors  and  teachers  ”  in  many  a 
church  and  nation),  “Let  there  be  no  strife,  I  pray 
“  thee,  between  thee  and  me,  between  my  herds- 
“  men  and  thy  herdsmen,  for  we  are  brethren.  Is 


34 


ABRAHAM  AND  ISAAC. 


Lect.  II. 


“not  the  whole  land  before  thee  ?  Separate  thyself, 
“  I  pray  thee,  from  me.  If  thou  wilt  take  the  left 
“  hand,  then  I  will  go  to  the  right ;  or,  if  thou  depart 
“  to  the  right*  hand,  I  will  go  to  the  left.”  1 

It  was  the  first  instance  of  “  agreeing  to  differ,”  in 
later  times  so  rarely  found,  so  eagerly  condemned  •  and 
vet  not  less  suitable  to  all  times,  because  of  the  ex- 
treme  simplicity  of  its  earliest  application. 

Meanwhile  let  us  take  our  stand  with  them  on  the 
mountain  east  of  Bethel.  The  indications  of  the  sacred 
text,  and  the  peculiar  position  of  the  localities,  enable 
us  to  fix  the  very  spot.  On  the  rocky  summit  of  that 
hill,  under  its  grove  of  oaks,  Abraham  had  pitched  his 
tent  and  built  his  altar, — the  first  of  the  high  places 
which  so  long  continued  in  Palestine  amongst  his 
descendants.  And  now,  from  this  spot,  he  and  his  kins¬ 
man  made  the  choice  which  determined  the  fate  of 
each,  according  to  the  view  which  that  summit  com¬ 
mands.  Lot  looked  down  on  the  green  valley  of  the 
Jordan,  its  tropical  luxuriance  visible  even  from  thence, 
beautiful  and  well-watered  as  that  garden  of  Eden  of 
which  the  fame  still  lingered  in  their  own  Chaldsean 
hills,  as  the  valley  of  the  Nile  in  which  they  had  so 
lately  sojourned.  He  chose  the  rich  soil,  and  with  it 


1  Gen.  xii.  8;  xiii.  3-17.  There 
is  another  like  passage  in  the  history 
of  Isaac :  I  give  it  as  it  appears  in 
the  Vulgate.  This,  by  translating  the 
Hebrew  proper  names,  preserves  the 
spirit  of  the  original,  which  in  our 
version  is  entirely  lost :  “  Isaac’s 

“servants  digged  in  the  valley,  and 
“  found  there  a  well  of  springing 
“  water ;  and  the  herdsmen  of  Gerar 
“  did  strive  with  Isaac’s  herdsmen, 
“  saying,  The  water  is  ours ;  and  he 


‘  called  the  name  Calumny ,  because 
4  they  strove  with  him.  And  they 
4  digged  another  well,  and  strove  for 
4  that  also ;  and  he  called  the  name 
4  of  it  Strife.  And  he  removed  from 
4  thence  and  digged  another  well, 
4  and  for  that  they  strove  not ;  and 
4  he  called  the  name  of  it  Latitude , 
4  and  he  said,  For  now  the  Lord  hath 
4  made  latitude  for  us,  and  we  shall 
4  be  fruitful  in  the  land.”  —  Gen. 
xxvi.  19-22. 


Lect.  II. 


THE  HALTING-PLACES. 


35 


the  corrupt  civilization  which  had  grown  up  in  the  rank 
climate  of  that  deep  descent;  and  once  more  he  turned 
his  face  eastward,  and  left  to  Abraham1  the  hardship, 
the  glory,  and  the  virtues  of  the  rugged  hills,  the  sea- 
breezes,  and  the  inexhaustible  future  of  Western  Pales¬ 
tine.  It  was  Abraham’s  henceforward ;  he  was  to  “  arise 
“  and  walk  through  the  length  and  through  the  breadth 
“  of  it,  for  God  had  given  it  to  him.”  This  was  the  first 
appropriation,  the  first  consecration  of  the  Holy  Land. 

3.  “Then  Abraham  removed  his  tent,  and  came  and 
“dwelt  in  the  4 oak-grove’  of  Mamre,  which  isTheoakof 
“  in  Hebron,  and  built  there  an  altar  unto  the  Mamre- 
“  Lord.” 2  Here  we  have  the  third  and  chief  resting-place 
of  the  wandering  Patriarch.  The  modern  town  of  He¬ 
bron,  or,  as  it  is  now  called  after  its  first  illustrious  occu¬ 
pant,  “  El  Khalil,”  “  The  Friend,”  lies  on  the  northern 
slope  of  a  basin  formed  by  the  confluence  of  two  broad 
valleys,  whose  superior  cultivation  and  vegetation  have 
probably  caused  the  long  historical  celebrity  of  this  spot 
as  the  earliest  seat  of  the  civilization  and  power,  if  not 
of  Palestine,  at  least  of  Judaea.  The  hills  which  rise 
above  it  on  the  north  present  for  a  considerable  distance 
a  level  table-land  slightly  broken  by  occasional  depres¬ 
sions,  now  mostly  occupied  by  cornfields.  It  is  on  this 
high  ground,  in  one  of  the  depressions,  that  a  large 
square  enclosure  of  ancient  masonry  marks  in  all  prob¬ 
ability  the  remains  of  the  sanctuary  which  the  Kings 
of  Judah  built  round  what  is  still  called  by  Jews  and 
Arabs  “The  House,”  or  “The  Height,”3  of  Abraham. 
On  this  spot,  in  the  time  of  Josephus,  a  gigantic  tere- 

1  It  is  on  this  divergence  of  the  2  Gen.  xiii.  18.  See  Sinai  and  Pal- 
characters  of  Lot  and  Abraham  that  estine,  142,  164. 
is  founded  the  legend  of  the  Holy  3  Ramet  el  Khalil.  See  Robinson, 
Cross,  commemorated  in  the  con-  Bib.  Res.  i.  216. 
vent  of  that  name  near  Jerusalem. 


36 


ABRAHAM  AND  ISAAC. 


Lect.  II 


binth  was  shown  as  coeval  with  the  Creation,  and  as 
being  that  under  which  the  tent  of  the  Patriarch  was 
pitched.  A  fair  used  to  be  held  under  its  branches,  in 
which  Christians,  Jews,  and  Arabs  assembled  every 
summer,  when  each  with  his  peculiar  rites  honored  the 
sacred  tree  with  the  images  and  pictures  which  hung 
from  its  branches.  Constantine  destroyed  the  images 
but  left  the  tree ;  and  its  trunk,  standing  in  the  midst 
of  the  church,  was  still  visible  in  the  seventeenth 
century.  Now,  the  only  indication  of  the  exact 
spot  is  a  deep  well,1  being  in  truth  precisely  what 
one  would  expect  to  find  hard  by  the  Patriarchal 
encampment. 

This  is  the  nearest  approach  to  a  home  that  the 
wanderings  of  Abraham  present.  Underneath  the  tree2 
his  tent  was  pitched  when  he  sat  in  the  heat  of  the 
Eastern  noon.  Thither  came  the  mysterious  visitants 
whose  reception  was  afterwards  commemorated  in  one 
of  the  pictures  hung  from  the  sacred  oak.  In  their  en¬ 
tertainment  is  presented  every  characteristic 3  of  genuine 
Arab  hospitality,  which  has  given  him  the  name  of 66  The 
Father  of  Guests.”  But  there  is  another  spot  in  He¬ 
bron  which  gives  a  yet  more  permanent  and  domestic 
character  to  its  connection  with  Abraham’s  life.  When 
Darius  pursued  the  Scythians  into  their  wilderness,  they 
told  him  that  the  only  place  which  they  could  appoint 

Cave  of  f°r  a  meeting  was  by  the  tombs  of  their  fathers. 
Machpeiah.  ^he  ancestra]  burial-place  is  the  one  fixed 

element  in  the  unstable  life  of  a  nomadic  race;  and 
this  was  what  Hebron  furnished  to  the  Patriarchs.  The 

1  Early  Travellers,  p.  87.  This  well  and  throughout,  “  plain  ”  =  “  oak- 
(at  the  south-west  corner  of  the  en-  grove.” 

closure)  is  not  mentioned  by  Robin-  3  For  the  haste  (Gen.  xviii.  6-8) 
son.  of  Arabian  hospitality,  see  Porter’s 

2  Genesis  xviii.  4,  “  the  tree,”  Damascus ,  i. 


Lect.  II. 


THE  HALTING-PLACES. 


37 


one  spot  of  earth  which  Abraham  could  call  his  own, 
the  pledge  which  he  left  of  the  perpetuity  of  his  in¬ 
terest  in  “  the  land  wherein  he  was  a  stranger,”  was  the 
sepulchre  which  he  bought  with  four  hundred  shekels 
of  silver  from  Ephron  the  Hittite.  It  was  a  rock  with 
a  double  cave  (“  Machpelah”),  standing  amidst  a  grove 
of  olives  or  ilexes,  on  the  slope  of  the  table-land  where 
the  first  encampment  had  been  made,  its  valley  prob¬ 
ably  occupying  the  same  position  with  regard  to  the 
ancient  town  of  Hebron,  that  the  sepulchral  valley  of 
Jehoshaphat  did  afterwards  to  Jerusalem.  Round  this 
venerable  cave  the  reverence  of  successive  ages  and 
religions  has  now  raised  a  series  of  edifices  which,  whilst 
they  preserve  its  identity,  conceal  it  entirely  from  view. 
But  there  it  still  remains.  Within  the  Mussulman 
mosque,  within  the  Christian  church,  within  the  massive 
stone  enclosure  built  by  the  Kings  of  Judah,  is,  beyond 
any  reasonable  question,  the  last  resting-place  of  Abra¬ 
ham  and  Sarah,  of  Isaac  and  Rebecca ;  “  and  there  Jacob 
“ buried  Leah;”  and  thither,  with  all  the  pomp  of 
funeral  state,  his  own  embalmed  body  was  brought 
from  the  palaces  of  Egypt.  Of  all  the  great  Patriarchal 
family,  Rachel  alone  is  absent.  All  that  has  ever  been 
seen  of  the  interior  of  the  mosque  (held  by  Mussulman 
pilgrims  to  be  the  fourth  most  sacred  in  the  world)  is 
the  floor  of  the  upper  chamber,  containing  six  chests, 
placed  there,  as  usual  in  Mussulman  sepulchres,  to 
represent  the  tombs  of  the  dead.  But  it  is  said  that 
here,  as  in  the  analogous  case  of  the  tomb  of  Aaron  on 
Mount  Hor,  the  real  cave  exists  beneath ;  divided  by 
an  artificial  floor  into  two  compartments,  into  the  upper 
one  of  which  only  the  chief  minister  of  the  mosque  is 
admitted  to  pray  in  times  of  great  calamity.  The  lower 
compartment,  containing  the  actual  graves,  is  entirely 


38 


ABRAHAM  AND  ISAAC. 


Lect.  II. 


closed,  and  has  never  been  seen  by  any  one1  within  the 
range  of  memory  or  tradition. 

4.  Although  the  oaks  of  Mamre  and  the  cave  of  Mach- 
_  u  v  pelah  rendered  Hebron  the  permanent  seat  of 

beersheba.  x  ^  x 

Patriarchal  life  beyond  any  spot  in  Palestine, 
and  although  they  are  always  henceforth  described  as 
lingering  around  this  green  and  fertile  vale,  there  is 
yet  another  circle  of  recollections  more  in  accordance 
with  their  ancient  pastoral  habits.  Even  at  the  moment 
of  the  purchase  of  the  sepulchre,  Abraham  represents 
himself  as  still  “  a  stranger  and  a  sojourner  in  the  land ;” 
and  as  such  his  haunts  were  elsewhere.  66  He  journeyed 
“  from  thence  toward  the  south  country,  and  dwTelt  be- 
“  tween  Kadesh  and  Shur,  and  sojourned  in  Gerar.” 
None  of  these  particular  spots  are  known  with  cer¬ 
tainty;  but  it  is  evident  that  we  are  now  far  away 
from  the  hills  of  Judaea,  in  the  wide  upland  valley,  or 
rather  undulating  plain,  sprinkled  with  shrubs,  and  wTith 
the  wild  flowers  which  indicate  the  transition  from  the 
pastures  of  Palestine  to  the  desert, — marked  also  by  the 
ancient  wells,  dug  far  into  the  rocky  soil,  and  bearing  on 
their  stone  or  marble  margins  the  traces  of  the  long 
ages  during  which  the  water  has  been  drawn  up  from 
their  deep  recesses.  Such  are  those  near  the  western 
extremity  of  the  plain,  still  bearing  in  their  name  their 
identification  with  “  the  well  of  the  oath,”  or  “  the  well 
of  the  Seven,”2  —  Beer-sheba — which  formed  the  last 
point  reached  by  the  patriarchs,  the  last  centre  of  their 
wandering  flocks  and  herds ;  and,  in  after-times,  from 
being  thus  the  last  inhabited  spot  on  the  edge  of  the 
desert,  the  southern  frontier  of  their  descendants.  This 

1  See,  however,  Benjamin  of  Tudela  sheba  ”  in  Dr.  Smith’s  Dictionary  of 

in  Early  Travellers ,  p.  87.  the  Bible. 

2  See  Mr.  Grove’s  articles  on  “  Beer- 


Lect.  II. 


THE  HALTING-PLACES. 


39 


southernmost  sanctuary  marks  the  importance  whicfy 
in  the  migratory  life  of  the  East,  was  and  is  always 
attached  to  the  possession  of  water.  Here  the  solemn 
covenant  was  made,  according  to  the  significant  Arab 
forms,  of  placing  the  seven  lambs 1  by  themselves,  be¬ 
tween  Abraham  and  the  only  chief  of  those  regions 
who  could  dispute  his  right,  the  neighboring  king  of 
the  Philistines  or  Avites.  “  And  Abraham,”  still  faith¬ 
ful  to  the  practice  which  he  had  followed  in  Canaan 
itself,  “ planted  there  a  sacred  grove,”2 — not  now  of 
ilex  or  terebinth,  which  never  descend  into  those  wild 
plains,  but  the  light  feathery  tamarisk,  the  first  and  the 
last  tree  which  the  traveller  sees  in  his  passage  through 
the  desert,  and  thus  the  appropriate  growth  of  this  spot. 
Beneath  this  grove  and  beside  these  wells  his  tents 
were  pitched,  and  “  he  called  there  on  the  name  of  the 
“  Lord,  the  everlasting  God.”  It  was  the  same  wilder¬ 
ness  into  which  Ishmael  had  gone  forth  and  become  an 
archer,  and  was  to  be  made  a  great  nation.  Is  it  not 
as  though  the  strong  Bedouin  (shall  we  add  the  strong 
parental)  instinct  had,  in  his  declining  days,  sprung  up 
again  in  the  aged  Patriarch? — as  if  the  unconquerable 
aversion  to  the  neighborhood  of  walls  and  cities,  or 
the  desire  to  meet  once  more  with  the  first-born  son 
who  recalled  to  him  his  own  early  days,  drew  him  down 
from  the  hills  of  Judaea  into  the  congenial  desert  ?  At 
any  rate  in  Beersheba,  we  are  told,  he  sojourned  “as 
a  stranger”  many  days.  In  Beersheba  Rebekah  was 
received  by  his  son  Isaac  into  Sarah’s  vacant  tent ;  and 
in  the  wilderness,  as  it  would  seem,  “  he  gave  up  the 
“  ghost  and  died  in  a  good  old  age,”  in  the  arms  of  his 
two  sons,  —  Isaac  the  gentle  herdsman  and  child  of 

1  Herod,  iii.  8.  Compare  Bahr’s  2  Gen.  xxi.  33.  Sinai  and  Pales- 
SymboliJc,  200.  tine ,  21. 


40 


ABRAHAM  AND  ISAAC. 


Lect.  II. 


promise,  Ishmael  the  Arabian  archer,  untamable  as  the 
wild 1  ass  of  the  desert, — “  and  they  buried  him  in  the 
“  cave  of  Machpelah.” 

II.  We  turn  from  this  external  framework  to  the 
simplicity  general  effect  of  the  Patriarchal  age,  as  sug- 
triarchafa"  gesfec4  amongst  many  other  scenes,  by  the  few 
age*  words  which  have  just  been  quoted  describing 
the  end  of  Abraham.  They  bring  home  to  us,  beyond 
any  other  writings,  the  force  and  the  beauty  of  simple 
feeling  and  natural  affection.  It  is  Homer,  and  more 
than  Homer,  carried  at  once  into  the  hands  and  hearts 
of  every  one.  We  all  know  the  instantaneous  effect  pro¬ 
duced  upon  us  in  countries,  however  distant,  in  classes 
or  races  of  men,  however  different  from  our  own,  by 
hearing  the  cry  of  a  little  child ;  with  what  irresistible 
force  it  reminds  us  that  we  belong  to  the  same  human 
family  •  how  suddenly  it  recalls  to  us,  however  far 
away,  the  thought  of  our  own  home.  Is  not  this  the 

exact  effect  of  reading  the  story  of  Ishmael  ? 

Ishmael.  . 

Kemote  as 

from  ourselves,  we  instantly  recognize  the  testimony 
to  our  common  nature  and  kindred  in  the  prayer  of 
Abraham  for  his  first-horn,  Ishmael, — the  child  who 
had  first  awakened  in  his  bosom  the  feeling  of  parental 
love: — “0  that  Ishmael  might  live  before  Thee:”2  or 
yet  more  in  the  pathetic  scene  where  the  imperious 
caprice  of  the  Arab  chieftainess  forbade  Hagar  and  her 
son  to  remain  any  longer  in  the  tent,  and  “  the  thing 
“  was  very  grievous  in  Abraham’s  sight  because  of  his 
“  son.  Abraham  rose  up  early  in  the  morning,  and  took 
“  bread  and  a  ‘  skin  ’  filled  with  water,  and  gave  it  to 
“  Hagar,  putting  it  on  her  shoulder,  and  the  child,  and 
“  sent  her  away  into  the  wilderness.” 

1  Gen.  xvi.  12  (Heb.).  2  Compare  Milman’s  Hist,  of  Jews ,  i.  13. 


it  is  in  language,  garb,  and  manner 


Lect.  II. 


THE  PATRIARCHAL  HOUSEHOLD. 


41 


Or  look  at  the  story  of  the  other  son,  the  child  of 
laughter  and  joy,  the  gentle  Isaac.  Head  the  narrative 
of  Eliezer’s  mission  to  fetch  Rebekah.  Track  every 
stage  of  that  journey — our  first  introduction  in  early 
childhood  to  the  pictures  of  Oriental  life,  only  deepened 
more  strongly  by  the  sight  of  the  reality.  Watch  the 
long  pilgrimage  over  river  and  mountain,  retraced  back 
to  the  original  settlement  of  the  race.  See  the  camels 
kneeling  beside  the  well  without  the  city ; 

K  0I3  c  lv  ah  • 

Rebekah  descending  the  flight  of  steps  with 
the  pitcher  on  her  shoulder,  exactly  as  the  traveller 
Niebuhr  met  the  Syrian  damsels  at  one  of  these  very 
wells.  Look  at  the  different  characters  as  they  come 
out,  one  by  one,  in  the  interview, — Eliezer,  the  faith¬ 
ful  slave  bent  solely  on  discharging  his  mission  :  "  I  will 
"  not  eat  till  I  have  told  mine  errand.  Hinder  me  not, 
"  seeing  that  the  Lord  hath  prospered  my  way.”  "  Send 
"me  away,  that  I  may  go  to  my  master;”  —  the  aged 
Bethuel  always  in  the  background;1 — Laban’s  hard 
temper  relaxing  when  he  sees  the  exact  ornaments  still 
so  dear  to  Arab  acquisitiveness  in  this  very  region,  the 
ear-ring  or  nose-ring,  and  the  bracelets  on  his  sister’s 
hands  ; — Rebekah,  eager  to  receive,  forward  to  go,  the 
same  high  spirit  as  we  shall  see  afterwards  in  her  future 
home.  "  I  will  draw  water  for  thy  camels  also  till  they 
"  have  done  drinking.”  "We  have  both  straw  and 
"  provender  enough,  and  room  to  lodge  in.”  "  And  they 
"  called  Rebekah,  and  said  unto  her  :  Wilt  thou  go  with 
"  this  man  ?  and  she  said,  I  will  go.”  "  And  they  sent 
"  away  Rebekah,  their  sister,  and  her  nurse.  And  they 
"  blessed  Rebekah  and  said  unto  her,  Thou  art  our  sister; 
"  be  thou  the  mother  of  thousands  of  millions,  and  let 

1  This  is  well  brought  out  by  Professor  Blunt,  Veracity  of  the  Books  of 
Moses,  ch.  v. 


6 


42 


ABRAHAM  AND  ISAAC. 


Lect.  II. 


“  thy  seed  possess  the  gate  of  them  that  hate  thee.” 
Nor  can  we  overlook  the  first  touch  of  what  may  be 
called  sentimental  feeling,  in  the  close  of  the  journey, 
when  the  mournful  meditations1  of  Isaac,  hy  the  well 
at  eventide,  are  suddenly  interrupted  by  the  arrival 
of  the  bride  :  “  And  he  brought  her  into  his  mother 
“  Sarah’s  tent,  and  Kebekah  became  his  wife ;  and  he 
“  loved  her,  and  Isaac  was  comforted  after  his  mother’s 
“  death” 

What  an  insight  into  the  primitive  age !  but  what  a 
cradle  also  for  the  earliest  religious  history!  We  often 
say  that  in  the  family  is  to  be  found  the  Patriarchal 
Church,  in  the  father  of  the  family  the  Patriarchal 
Priest.  It  is  indeed  so  in  more  senses  than  one.  When 
we  think  of  the  many  periods  in  which  the  relations  of 
brother  and  sister,  father  and  child,  husband  and  wife, 
have,  even  by  good  men,  been  thrust  into  the  back¬ 
ground  as  unworthy  of  a  place  in  the  religious  rela¬ 
tions  of  mankind,  we  may  well  hail  this  first  chapter  of 
Ecclesiastical  History,  as  possessing  far  more  than  a 
merely  poetical  value.  It  is  like  one  of  those  ancient 
Patriarchal  wells  so  often  mentioned  in  the  history.  Its 
waters  are  still  fresh  and  clear  in  its  deep  recess.  It 
has  outlasted  all  other  changes.  It  ministers  indeed 
only  to  human  affections  and  feelings,  but  it  is  precisely 
to  those  feelings  which  are  as  lasting  as  the  human 
heart  itself,  and  which  therefore  give  and  receive  from 
the  record  which  so  responds  to  them,  a  testimony 
which  will  never  pass  away. 

III.  And  now  turn  from  the  Patriarchal  household 
External  to  its  points  of  contact  with  the  external  world. 

relations  of  ± 

Abraham.  These  are  perhaps  what  most  escape  us  as  we 

1  “  Mournful.”  See  Blunt,  Vera-  “  By  the  well,”  LXX.  Gen.  xxiv. 
city  of  the  Books  of  Moses,  ch.  v.  63. 


Lect.  II. 


EXTERNAL  RELATIONS. 


43 


read  it  for  other  purposes,  and  therefore  what  may  be 
most  fitly  noticed  here. 

1.  The  general  relations  of  Abraham  to  the  Canaan- 
itish  tribes  have  a  twofold  aspect.  On  the  one  To  the 

x  .  Canaanites 

hand,  as  if  with  the  full  consciousness  of  the  generally, 
separation  which  was  to  exist  between  his  seed  and  the 
tribes  of  Canaan,  and  also  of  its  future  superiority  over 
them,  he  always  keeps  himself  distinct  from  them :  he 
professes  to  be  a  stranger  amongst  them ;  he  will  accept 
no  favor  at  their  hands;  he  will  not  have  any  inter¬ 
marriage  between  his  race  and  theirs ;  he  refuses  the 
gift  of  the  sepulchre  from  Ephron,  and  of  the  spoils 
from  the  King  of  Sodom.  The  tomb  of  Machpelah  is 
a  proof  standing  to  this  day,  of  the  long  predetermined 
assurance  that  the  children  of  Abraham  should  inherit 
the  land  in  which  this  was  their  ancestor’s  sole,  but  most 
precious  possession.  It  is  like  the  purchase  of  the  site 
of  Hannibal’s  camp  by  the  strong  faith  and  hope  of  the 
besieged  senators  of  Rome. 

But  on  the  other  hand,  there  is  not  in  his  actual  deal¬ 
ings  with  the  Canaanites  a  trace  of  the  implacable  en¬ 
mity  of  later  ages ;  no  shadow  cast  before,  of  long  wars 
of  extermination  waged  against  them;  no  indication 
of  what,  in  modern  times,  has  been  supposed  to  be 
the  origin  of  so  many  dark  legends,  and  severe  accu¬ 
sations, —  the  national  hatred  of  rivals  and  neighbors. 
The  anticipation  of  distinctness  and  superiority  is  not 
more  decided  in  one  class  of  incidents  than  the  absence 
of  any  anticipation  of  war  or  animosity  is  in  another. 
Abimelech,  Ephron,  Mamre,  Melchizedek,  all  either  wor¬ 
ship  the  same  God,  or,  if  they  worship  Him  under 
another1  name,  are  all  bound  together  by  ties  of  hos- 

1  The  God  of  Melchizedek  (Gen.  xiv.  18)  was  not  Eloah  or  Elohim ,  but 
Eliun,  the  name  given  to  the  God  of  Phoenicia  by  Sanchoniathon  (Kenrick, 
Phoen.  288). 


44 


ABRAHAM  AND  ISAAC. 


Lect.  n 


pitality  and  friendship.  The  times  when  the  Canaanite 
is  to  be  utterly  destroyed,  when  the  Amalekite  is  to  be 
hewn  in  pieces,  when  the  Jews  are  to  have  no  deal¬ 
ings  with  the  Samaritans,  are  still  very  far  beyond 
us :  we  are  still  above  the  point  of  separation  be¬ 
tween  the  various  tribes  of  Syria:  distinction  has  not 
yet  grown  into  difference  •  u  the  iniquity  of  the  Amo- 
“  rites  is  not  yet  full.”  To  overlook  the  unity,  the 
comparative  unity,  between  Abraham  and  the  neigh¬ 
bor  races  of  Palestine,  would  be  to  overlook  one  of 
the  most  valuable  testimonies  to  the  antiquity,  the 
general  Patriarchal  spirit  of  the  record  as  it  has  been 
handed  down  to  us. 

2.  Further,  there  are  the  more  special  occasions  on 
which  Abraham  is  drawn,  as  it  were,  out  of  the  pas¬ 
toral  or  individual  life,  into  wider  relations.  The  chief 
of  these  is  the  journey  into  Egypt. 

I  shall  not  endeavor  here,  or  elsewhere,  to  deter¬ 
mine,  where  uncertainty  still  prevails,  the  special 
points  where  the  history  or  chronology  of  Egypt  or 
Judea  cross  each  other’s  path :  neither  shall  I  draw 
out  at  any  length,  what  in  this  instance  is  but 
slightly  noticed  by  the  sacred  story,  the  impression 
Abraham  left  by  Egypt  on  the  mind  of  this,  the  first 
m  Egypt.  0f  the  myriad  travellers  who  have  visited  the 
valley  of  the  Nile.  But  it  is  impossible  not  to  pause 
for  a  moment  on  the  few  points  which  this  event 
suggests  to  us.  It  is  the  earliest  known  appearance 
in  Egypt  of  the  nomadic  races  of  Asia,  who,  under 
the  Shepherd  Kings,  exercised  so  great  an  influence 
over  its  destinies  in  its  primitive  history,  —  who,  un¬ 
der  the  Arab  conquerors,  have  now  for  thirteen  cen¬ 
turies  occupied  it  as  their  own.  Charlemagne  is  said 
to  have  wept  in  anticipation  of  the  coming  misfor- 


Lect.  II. 


EXTERNAL  RELATIONS. 


45 


tunes  of  his  empire  when  he  saw  the  sail  of  the  first 
Norman  ship  on  the  waters  of  the  Mediterranean. 
And  the  ancient  Pharaoh,  whoever  he  was,  might 
have  wept  in  like  manner,  could  he  have  foreseen  in 
that  innocent  and  venerable  figure  the  first  of  the 
long  succession  of  Asiatic  wanderers,  like  in  outward 
form,  though  unlike  in  almost  all  beside,  attracted  to 
the  valley  of  the  Nile  by  the  very  same  motives, 
coming  down  from  the  table-lands  or  parched  valleys 
of  their  own  deserts  or  mountains,  because  "  the  famine 
“was  grievous  in  the  land,”  and  sojourning  in  Egypt, 
because  its  river  gave  the  plenteous  sustenance  which 
elsewhere  they  sought  in  vain.1 

If  the  Egyptian  may  have  been  startled  by  the 
sight  of  Abraham,  much  more  may  Abraham  have 
been  moved  to  awe  by  his  approach  into  Egypt. 
Whatever  may  be  said  in  legendary  tales  of  his  con¬ 
nection  with  Nimrod  and  the  Assyrian  powers,  this 
arrival  in  Eg}^pt  is  the  only  indication  given  by  the 
sacred  historian  of  any  conscious  entrance  into  the 
presence  of  a  great  earthly  kingdom.  The  very  craft 
into  which  the  Patriarch  is  betrayed  "as  he  was  come 
"  near  to  enter  into  Egypt  ”  is  not  without  its  signifi¬ 
cance.  "  They  will  kill  me,  but  they  will  save  thee 
“  alive ;  say,  I  pray  thee,  thou  art  my  sister,  and  it 
"  shall  be  well  with  me  for  thy  sake,  and  my  soul 
“  shall  live  because  of  thee.”  His  faith  and  courage 
are  unnerved  at  the  prospect  and  at  the  sight  of  the 
great  potentate  amidst  his  princes  in  his  royal  house, 
with  his  harem  and  his  treasures  around  him.  Yet 
it  is  also  characteristic  of  •  the  Biblical  narrative,  that 
the  impression  left  upon  us  by  this  first  contact  of 
the  Church  with  the  World  is  not  purely  unfavorable. 

1  Isaac  was  going  down  in  like  manner,  when  he  was  stopped.  Gen.  xxvi.  2 


46 


ABRAHAM  AND  ISAAC. 


Lect.  II 


It  has  been  truly  remarked1  that  throughout  the 
Scriptures  the  milder  aspect  of  the  world  is  always 
presented  to  us  through  Egypt,  the  darker  through 
Babylon.  Abraham  is  the  exile  from  Chaldaea,  but  he 
is  the  guest,  the  client  of  the  Pharaohs.  He  dwells, 
according  to  the  account  of  a  Pagan  historian,  many 
years  in  the  sacred  city  of  On,  where  afterwards  his 
descendants  lived  so  long,  and  there  teaches  the  Egyp¬ 
tians  astronomy.2  He  receives  (as  we  infer  from  the 
sacred  narrative)  the  gifts  of  male  and  female  slaves, 
of  asses  and  camels,  with  which  then  as  now  the 
streets  of  the  Egj^ptian  cities  abounded.  He  departs 
in  peace.  And  such  as  Egypt  is  described  in  this 
narrative,  such  both  in  its  secular  greatness  and  in  its 
religious  neutrality  it  appears  to  have  been  in  those 
of  her  monuments  which  alone  can  be  with  certainty 
ascribed  to  its  most  ancient  period.  The  range  of 
the  thirty  pyramids,  in  all  probability,  even  at  that 
early  time  looked  down  on  the  plain  of  Memphis. 
They  remain  to  indicate  the  same  long  anterior  state 
of  civilization  which  the  story  of  Abraham  itself  im¬ 
plies,  yet  exhibit  neither  in  their  own  sepulchral  cham¬ 
bers,  nor  in  those  which  immediately  surround  them, 
any  of  those  signs  of  grotesque  idolatry  which  give 
additional  point  to  the  story  of  the  Exodus,  and  which 
exist  in  the  later  monuments  of  Thebes  and  Ip- 
sambul. 

3.  The  next  notice  of  Abraham's  connection  with 
war  with  the  outer  world  is  of  a  wholly  different  kind, 
luoraer.  and  is  far  more  in  accordance  with  the  secu¬ 
lar  aspect  of  his  life  presented  in  Gentile  historians 
than  anything  else  which  the  sacred  narrative  pre¬ 
sents.  “ Abram  the  Hebrew”  (so,  as  if  from  an  ex- 

l  Arnold,  Sermons  on  Prophecy.  2  Eupolemus  (Eus.  Prcep.  ix.  1 7). 


Lect.  II. 


EXTERNAL  RELATIONS. 


47 


ternal  point  of  view  the  fragment,  apparently  of  some 
ancient  record,1  represents  him)  was  dwelling  in  state 
at  Hebron,  in  the  midst,  not  merely  of  his  familiar 
circle,  but  of  his  three  hundred  and  eighteen  trusty 
slaves,  and  confederate  not  merely  with  the  peaceful 
Ephron,  but,  after  the  manner  of  the  Canaanite  chiefs 
of  later 2  times,  with  the  Amo  rite  mountaineers,  Mamre, 
and  his  brothers  Aner  and  Eshcol.  Suddenly  a  mes¬ 
senger  of  woe  appeared  by  the  tent  of  the  Hebrew. 
From  the  remote  East,  a  band  of  kings 3  had  descended 
on  the  circle  of  cultivation  and  civilization  which  lay 
deep  ensconced  in  the  bosom  of  the  Jordan  valley. 
They  had  struck  dismay  far  and  wide  amongst  the 
aboriginal  tribes  of  the  desert,  all  along  the  east  of 
the  Jordan  and  down  to  the  remote  wilds  of  Petra, 
and  up  into  the  mountain  fastness  and  secluded  palm- 
grove  of  Engedi.  In  the  green  vale  beside  the  shores 
of  the  lake  the  five  Canaanite  kings  rose  against  the 
invaders  on  their  return,  but  were  entangled  in  the 
bituminous  pits  of  their  own  native  region.  The  con¬ 
querors  swept  them  away,  and  marched  homewards 
the  whole  length  of  the  valley  of  the  Jordan,  carry¬ 
ing  off  their  plunder,  and  above  all  the  war4  horses 
for  which  afterwards  Canaan  became  so  famous.  But 
from  the  defeat  in  the  vale  of  Siddim  had  escaped 
one  who  climbed  the  wall  of  rocks  that  overhang  the 
field  of  battle,  and  announced  to  the  new  colony 
established  beneath  the  oak  of  Hebron  that  their 
kinsman  had  been  carried  away  captive.  Instantly 
Abraham  called  his  allies  together,  and  with  them 

1  For  the  character  and  importance  of  Chedorlaomer  and  Amraphel  has 

of  this  chapter  as  an  historical  record,  been  found  in  the  Assyrian  monu- 
Eee  Ewald,  Gesch.  i.  401,  &c.  ments.  Rawlinson’s  Herod,  i.  436, 

2  Josh.  x.  3 ;  xi.  1,  2,  &c.  446. 

3  Some  slight  likeness  to  the  names  *  Gen.  xiv.  11,  21  (LXX.). 


48 


ABRAHAM  AND  ISAAC. 


Lect.  II. 


and  his  armed  retainers  he  pursued  the  enemy,  and 
(if  we  may  add  the  details  from  Josephus1)  on  the 
fifth  day,  at  the  dead  of  night,  attacked  the  host  as 
it  lay  sleeping  round  the  sources  of  the  Jordan. 
They  fled  over  the  range  of  Antilibanus,  and  once 
more  Abraham  beheld  the  scene  of  his  first  conquest, 
the  city  of  Damascus,  and  in  its  neighborhood,  in  a 
village  still  hearing  the  same  name  (Hobah),2  he  finally 
routed  the  army  and  rescued  the  captives,  and  returned 
again  to  the  banks  of  the  Jordan.  In  a  vale  or  level 
spot  not  far  from  the  river,  called  probably  from  this 
encounter  “  the  vale  of  the  king  ”  or  “  of  the  kings,”  the 
victorious  chief  was  met  by  two  grateful  princes  of 
the  country  which  he  had  delivered ;  one  was  the 
King  of  Sodom,  the  other  was  one  whose  name  in 
Meichiz-  itself  commands  respectful  awe, — Melchizedek, 
the  King  of  Kighteousness.  Whence  he  came, 
from  what  parentage,  remains  untold,  nay  even  of 
what  place  he  was  king  remains  uncertain  (for  Salem 
may  be  either  Jerusalem  or  the  smaller  town  of  wdiich 
in  after-times  the  ruins  were  shown  to  Jerome,  not 
far  from  the  scene  of  the  interview).  He  appears  for 
a  moment,  and  then  vanishes  from  our  view  altogether. 
It  is  this  which  wraps  him  round  in  that  mysterious 
obscurity  which  has  rendered  his  name  the  symbol 
of  all  such  sudden,  abrupt  apparitions,  the  interrup¬ 
tions,  the  dislocations,  if  one  may  so  say,  of  the  ordi¬ 
nary  even  succession  of  cause  and  effect  and  matter 
of  fact  in  the  various  stages  of  the  history  of  the 
Church,  “  without  father,  without  mother,  without  be- 

1  Ant.  i.  10,  1.  Compare  also  Eus.  mosque  of  Abraham,  still  the  object 

Pr<xp.  ix.  17.  of  pilgrimage,  an  hour  north  of  Da- 

2  Gen.  xiv.  15.  The  scene  of  this  mascus.  Porter,  i.  82. 
is  commemorated  in  a  chapel  or 


Lect.  II. 


EXTERNAL  RELATIONS. 


49 


"ginning  or  end  of  days ”  No  wonder  that  in  Jewish 
times  he  was  regarded  as  some  remnant  of  the  earlier 
world  —  Arphaxad1  or  Shem.  No  wonder  that  when, 
in  after-times,  there  arose  One  whose  appearance  was 
beyond  and  above  any  ordinary  influence  of  time  or 
place  or  earthly  descent,  the  author  of  the  Epistle  to  the 
Hebrews  could  find  no  fitter  expression  for  this  aspect 
of  his  character  than  the  mysterious  likeness  of  Melchiz- 
edek.  But  there  is  enough  of  interest  if  we  merely 
confine  ourselves  to  the  letter  of  the  ancient  narrative. 
He  was  the  earliest  instance  of  that  ancient,  sacred, 
though  long  corrupted  and  long  abused  name,  not  yet 
disentangled  from  the  regal  office,  hut  still  of  sufficient 
distinctness  to  make  itself  felt :  “  Priest  of  the  Most 
" High  God”  That  title  of  Divinity  also  appears  for  the 
first  time  in  the  history ;  and  we  catch  from  a  heathen 
author  a  clew  to  the  spot  of  the  earliest  primeval 
sanctuary  where  that  Supreme  Name  was  honored 
with  priestly  and  regal  service.  Tradition2  told  that 
it  was  on  Mount  Gerizim  Melchizedek  ministered.  On 
that  lofty  summit,  from  Melchizedek  even  to  the  pres¬ 
ent  day,  when  the  Samaritans  still  maintain  that 
"  on  this  mountain  ”  God  is  to  be  worshipped,  the 
rough  rock,  smoothed  into  a  natural  altar,  is  the  only 
spot  in  Palestine,  perhaps  in  the  world,  that  has  never 
ceased  to  he  the  scene  of  sacrifice  and  prayer.  But 
what  is  now  the  last  relic  of  a  local  and  exhausted 
though  yet  venerable  religion,  was  in  those  Patri¬ 
archal  times  the  expression  of  a  wide  all-embracing 
worship,  which  comprehended  within  its  range  the 
ancient  chiefs  of  Canaan  and  the  founder  of  the  chosen 

1  Jerome,  Epist.  ad  Evangelum ,  2  Eupolemus  (Eus.  Prcep.  Ev.  ix. 

§  5  ;  and  Liber  Hebr.  Qucest.  in  Gen -  17). 

esim,  ad  loc. 


7 


50 


ABRAHAM  AND  ISAAC. 


Lect.  IL 


people.  The  meeting  of  the  two  in  the  “  King’s  Dale  ” 
personifies  to  us  the  meeting  between  what,  in  later 
times,  has  been  called  Natural  and  Revealed  Religion ; 
and  when  Abraham1  received  the  blessing  of  Melchiz- 
edek,  and  tendered  to  him  his  reverent  homage,  it 
is  a  likeness  of  the  recognition  which  true  historical 
Faith  will  always  humbly  receive  and  gratefully  render, 
when  it  comes  in  contact  with  the  older  and  everlast¬ 
ing  instincts  of  that  religion  which  “the  Most  High 
“  God,  Possessor  of  Heaven  and  Earth,”  has  implanted 
in  nature  and  in  the  heart  of  man,  in  “  the  power  of 
“an  endless  life.” 

4.  There  is  yet  another  occasion  on  which  Abraham 
Abraham  appears  in  connection,  not  indeed  with  the 
Sfesof the  revolutions  of  armies  or  of  empires,  but  with 
pla,n‘  the  more  awful  convulsions  which  agitate  the 
fabric  of  the  world  itself.  What  were  the  precise 
special  means  by  which  the  fertile  vale  of  Siddim  was 
blasted  with  eternal  barrenness  —  how  and  to  what 
extent  the  five  guilty  cities  of  the  plain  were  over¬ 
thrown,  is  still  a  vexed  question  equally  with  theo¬ 
logians  and  geologists.2  We  need  only  here  consider 
the  aspect  of  the  catastrophe,  as  it  was  presented  to 
the  Patriarch.  I  will  not  weaken  by  repetition  the 
well-known  words  in  which  the  “  Friend  of  God  ”  and 
of  man  draws  near  to  plead  before  the  Judge  of  all 
the  earth  against  the  indiscriminate  destruction  of  the 
righteous  with  the  wicked.  Such  an  union  of  the 
yearnings  of  compassion  with  the  sense  of  justice  and 
of  profound  resignation,  such  a  sympathy  with  the 
calamities,  not  only  of  his  6wn  countrymen  but  of  a 

1  Jerome,  Epist.  ad  Evangelum,§  6,  ham  gave  tithes  to  Melchizedek  or 
justly  remarks  that  the  narrative  Melchizedek  to  Abraham, 
leaves  it  ambiguous  'whether  Abra-  2  Sinai  and  Palestine ,  289. 


Lect.  II. 


SACRIFICE  OF  ISAAC. 


51 


foreign  and  a  detested  race,  must  in  that  distant  age  be 
counted  (to  say  the  least)  as  a  marvellous  anticipa¬ 
tion  of  a  higher  morality  and  religion,  such  as  we  are 
accustomed  to  think  peculiarly  our  own.  Read  and 
study  that  chapter  well ;  we  may  go  much  farther 
and  fare  much  worse,  even  in  modern  and  Christian 
times,  in  seeking  a  true  justification  of  the  ways  of 
God  to  man.  “  And  on  the  morrow  Abraham  gat  up 
“early  in  the  morning  to  the  place  where  he  stood 
“before  the  Lord”  The  hill  is  still  pointed  out1 
amongst  the  many  summits  near  Hebron  command¬ 
ing  a  view  down  into  the  deep  gulf  which  parts  the 
mountains  of  Judsea  from  those  vast,  unknown,  un¬ 
visited  ranges  which,  with  their  caves  and  wide  table¬ 
lands,  invite  the  fugitives  from  the  plain  below.  The 
subsequent  history  of  that  chasm  was  like  a  perpetual 
memorial  of  Abraham’s  prayer.  The  guilty  cities  dis¬ 
appear  forever.  The  descendants  of  the  innocent  fugi¬ 
tives  become  the  powerful  nations,  of  mixed  character 
and  dark  origin,  —  Ammon  and  Moab. 

IV.  Lastly,  the  history  of  the  world  and  of  the 
Church  requires  us  to  notice  the  act  of  faith  sacrifice  of 
which  takes  us  back  into  the  innermost  life  Isaac" 
of  Abraham  himself,  and  marks  at  least  one  critical 
stage  in  the  progress  of  the  True  Religion.2  There 
have  been  in  almost  all  ancient  forms  of  Religion,  in 
most  modern  forms  also,  strong  tendencies,  each  in  itself 
springing  from  the  best  and  purest  feelings  of  human¬ 
ity,  yet  each,  if  carried  into  the  extremes  suggested 
by  passion  or  by  logic,  incompatible  with  the  other 

1  Now  called  Beni-naim ;  probably  -396  ;  Maurice,  Doctrine  of  Sacrifice , 

the  ancient  Caphar-Barucha.  See  33  ;  Ewald,  i.  430  ;  iv.  76  ;  Bunsen’s 
Jerome,  Epit.  Paulas,  §11;  and  Rob-  Gott  in  Geschichte ,  i.  170;  and  (in 
inson,  i.  490.  part)  Kurtz’s  History  of  the  Old 

2  See  Arnold’s  Sermons,  vol.  ii.  394  Covenant ,  i.  §  15. 


U,  OF  ILL  Liu. 


52 


ABRAHAM  AND  ISAAC. 


Lect.  II. 


and  with  its  own  highest  purpose.  One  is  the  crav¬ 
ing  to  please,  or  to  propitiate,  or  to  communicate  with 
the  Powers  above  us  by  surrendering  some  object  near 
and  dear  to  ourselves.  This  is  the  source  of  all  Sac¬ 
rifice.  The  other  is  the  profound  moral  instinct  that 
the  Creator  of  the  world  cannot  be  pleased  or  pro¬ 
pitiated  or  approached  by  any  other  means  than  a 
pure  life  and  good  deeds.  On  the  exaggeration,  on 
the  contact,  on  the  collision,  of  these  two  tendencies, 
have  turned  some  of  the  chief  corruptions,  and  some 
of  the  chief  difficulties,  of  Ecclesiastical  History.  The 
earliest  of  these  we  are  about  to  witness  in  the  life 
of  Abraham.  There  came,  we  are  told,  the  Divine 
intimation,  “Take  now  thy  son,  thine  only  son  Isaac, 
“  whom  thou  lovest,  and  .  .  .  offer  him  for  a  burnt- 
u  offering  on  one  of  the  mountains  which  I  will  tell 
“  thee  of.  ”  It  was  in  its  spirit  the  exact  expres¬ 
sion  of  the  feeling  of  self-devotion  without  which 
Religion  cannot  exist,  and  of  which  the  whole  life  of 
the  Patriarch  had  been  the  great  example.  But  the 
form  taken  by  this  Divine  trial  or  temptation1  was 
that  which  a  stern  logical  consequence  of  the  ancient 
view  of  Sacrifice  did  actually  assume,  if  not  then,  yet 
certainly  in  after-ages,  among  the  surrounding  tribes, 
and  which  cannot  therefore  be  left  out  of  sight  in 
considering  the  whole  historical  aspect  of  the  narra¬ 
tive.  Deep  in  the  heart  of  .the  Canaanitish  nations 
was  laid  the  practice  of  human  sacrifice;  the  very 

1  That  this  temptation  or  trial,  where  the  same  temptation,  which  in 
through  whatever  means  it  was  sug-  one  book  is  ascribed  to  God,  is  in 
gested,  should  in  the  sacred  narrative  another  ascribed  to  Satan  :  “  The  Lord 
be  ascribed  to  the  overruling  voice  of  moved  David  to  say,  Go,  number 
God,  is  in  exact  accordance  with  the  Israel  ”  (2  Sam.  xxiv.  1).  “  Satan 

general  tenor  of  the  Hebrew  Scrip-  provoked  David  to  number  Israel” 
tures.  A  still  more  striking  instance  (1  Chron.  xxi.  1). 
is  contained  in  the  history  of  David, 


Lect.  II. 


SACRIFICE  OF  ISAAC. 


55 


offering  here  described,  of  “  children  passing  through 
“  the  fire,”  “  of  their  sons  and  of  their  daughters,” 
“  of  the  first-born  for  their  transgressions,  the  fruit  of 
u  their  body  for  the  sin  of  their  soul.”  On  the  altars 
of  Moab,  and  of  Phoenicia,  and  of  the  distant  Canaanite 
settlements  in  Carthage  and  in  Spain,  nay  even,  at 
times,  in  the  confines  of  the  Chosen  People  itself,  in 
the  wild  vow  of  Jephthah,  in  the  sacrifice  of  Saul’s  sons 
at  Gibeah,  in  the  dark  sacrifices  of  the  valley  of  Hin- 
nom  under  the  very  walls  of  Jerusalem  —  this  almost 
irrepressible  tendency  of  the  burning  zeal  of  a  primi¬ 
tive  race  found  its  terrible  expression.  Such  was  the 
trial  which  presented  itself  to  Abraham.  From  the 
tents  of  Beersheba  he  set  forth  at  the  rising  of  the 
sun,  and  went  unto  the  place  of  which  God  had  told 
him.  It  was  not  the  place,  which  Jewish  tradition 
has  selected  on  Mount  Moriah  at  Jerusalem,  still  less 
that  which  Christian  tradition  shows,  even  to  the 
thicket  in  which  the  ram  was  caught,  hard  by  the 
church  of  the  Holy  Sepulchre ;  still  less  that  which 
Mussulman  tradition  indicates  on  Mount  Arafat  at 
Mecca.  Bather  we  must  look  to  that  ancient  sanctu¬ 
ary  of  which  I  have  already  spoken,  the  natural  altar 
on  the  summit  of  Mount  Gerizim.1  On  that  spot,  at 
that  time  the  holiest  in  Palestine,  the  crisis  wTas  to 
take  place.  One,  two,  three  days’  journey  from  land 
of  the  Philistines — in  the  distance  the  high  crest  of 
the  mountain  appears.  And  “  Abraham  lifted  up  his 
“eyes  and  saw  the  place  afar  off.”  .  .  . 

The  sacrifice,  the  resignation  of  the  will,  in  the 
Father  and  the  Son2  was  accepted;  the  literal  sacri- 

1  Sinai  and  Palestine ,  251.  pathos  in  the  collection  of  legends  in 

2  The  dialogue  between  Abraham  Beer’s  Leben  Abrahams ,  56-70. 
and  Isaac  is  given  with  considerable 


54 


ABRAHAM  AND  ISAAC. 


Lect.  II. 


flee  of  the  act  was  repelled.  On  the  one  hand,  the 
great  principle  was  proclaimed  that  mercy  is  better 
than  sacrifice  —  that  the  sacrifice  of  self  is  the  high¬ 
est  and  holiest  offering  that  God  can  receive.  On  the 
other  hand,  the  inhuman  superstitions,  towards  which 
the  ancient  ceremonial  of  sacrifice  was  perpetually 
tending,  were  condemned  and  cast  out  of  the  true 
worship  of  the  Church  forever.1 

There  are  doubtless  many  difficulties  which  may  be 
raised  on  the  offering  of  Isaac;  but  there  are  few,  if 
any,  which  will  not  vanish  away  before  the  simple 
pathos  and  lofty  spirit  of  the  narrative  itself,  provided 
that  we  take  it,  as  in  fairness  it  must  be  taken,  as  a 
whole;  its  close  not  parted  from  its  commencement, 
nor  its  commencement  from  its  close,  —  the  subordi¬ 
nate  parts  of  the  transaction  not  raised  above  its 
essential  primary  intention.  And  there  is  no  diffi¬ 
culty  which  will  not  be  amply  compensated  by  re¬ 
flecting  on  the  near  approach,  and  yet  the  complete 
repulse,  of  the  danger  which  might  have  threatened 
the  early  Church.  Nothing  is  so  remarkable  a  proof 
of  a  divine  and  watchful  interposition,  as  the  deliver¬ 
ance  from  the  infirmity,  the  exaggeration,  the  excess, 
whatever  it  is,  to  which  the  noblest  minds  and  the 
noblest  forms  of  religion  are  subject.  We  have  a 
proverb  which  tells  us  that  “  Man’s  extremity  is  God’s 
opportunity.”  S.  Jerome  tells2  us  that  the  corre¬ 
sponding  proverb  amongst  the  Jews  was  “In  the 


1  According  to  the  Phoenician  tra¬ 
dition,  “  Israel,  king  of  the  country, 
“  having  by  a  nymph  called  Anobret 
u  [‘  the  Hebrew  fountain  ’]  an  only 
“  son,  whom  they  called  Ieoud,  the 
“  Phoenician  word  for  only  son,”  [so 
applied  to  Isaac,  Gen.  xxii.  2]  on 


“  occasion  of  a  great  national  calamity 
“  adorned  him  with  royal  attire,  and 
“  sacrificed  him  on  an  altar  which  he 
“  had  prepared.” —  Sanchoniathon,  see 
Ken  rick’s  Phoenicia,  288. 

2  In  his  Qucestiones  Hebraicae  on 
Gen.  xxii.  14. 


Lect.  II. 


SACRIFICE  OF  ISAAC. 


55 


mount  of  the  Lord  it  shall  he  seen/’  or  “  In  the 
mountain  the  Lord  will  provide/’  —  that  is,  “  As  He 
had  pity  on  Abraham,  so  He  will  have  pity  on  us.” 

A  few  words  remain  to  he  added  on  the  relation  of 
this  crowning  scene  of  the  beginning  of  sacred  history 
to  the  crowning  scene  of  its  close.  The  thoughts  of 
Christian  readers  almost  inevitably  wander  from  one 
to  the  other;  and  without  entering  into  details  of 
controversy  or  doctrine  which  would  be  here  out  of 
place,  there  is  a  common  ground  which  no  one  need 
fear  to  recognize.  The  doctrine  of  the  types  of  the 
Ancient  Dispensation  has  often  been  pushed  to  excess. 
But  there  is  a  sense  in  which  the  connection  indicated 
thereby  admits  of  no  dispute,  and  which  may  be  illus¬ 
trated  even  by  other  history  than  that  with  which  we 
are  now  concerned.  Not  only  in  Sacred,  but  even 
in  Grecian  and  Roman  history,  do  the  earliest  records 
sometimes  foreshadow  and  represent  to  us  the  latest 
fortunes  of  the  nation  or  power  then  coming  into 
existence.  Whoever  is  (if  we  may  thus  combine  the 
older  and  the  more  modern  use  of  the  word)  the 
type  of  the  nation  or  race  at  any  marked  period  of 
its  course  is  also  the  type  of  its  final  consummation. 
Abraham  and  Abraham’s  son,  in  obedience,  in  resig¬ 
nation,  in  the  sacrifice  of  whatever  could  be  sacrificed 
short  of  sin,  form  an  anticipation,  which  cannot  be 
mistaken,  of  that  last  and  greatest  event  which  closes 
the  history  of  the  Chosen  People.  We  leap,  as  by  a 
natural  instinct,  from  the  sacrifice  in  the  land  of 
Moriah  to  the  sacrifice  of  Calvary.  There  are  many 
differences  —  there  is  a  danger  of  exaggerating  the 
resemblance,  or  of  confounding  in  either  case  what  is 
subordinate  with  what  is  essential.  But  the  general 
feeling  of  Christendom  has  in  this  respect  not  gone 


56 


ABRAHAM  AND  ISAAC. 


Lect.  II 


far  astray.  Each  event,  if  we  look  at  it  well,  and 
understand  it  rightly,  will  serve  to  explain  the  other. 
In  the  very  point  of  view  in  which  I  have  just  been 
speaking  of  it,  the  likeness  is  most  remarkable.  Human 
sacrifice,  it  has  been  well  said,  which  in  outward  form 
most  nearly  resembled  the  death  on  the  Cross,  is  in 
Spirit  the  furthest  removed  from  it.  Human  sacri¬ 
fice,  as  we  have  seen,  which  was  in  outward  form 
nearest  to  the  offering  of  Isaac,  was  in  fact  and  in 
spirit  most  entirely  condemned  and  repudiated  by 
it.  The  union  of  parental  love  with  the  total  denial 
of  self  is  held  up  in  both  cases  as  the  highest  model 
of  human,  and  therefore  as  the  shadow  of  Divine, 
Love.  “  Sacrifice  ”  is  rejected,  but  “to  do  Thy  will,  0 
God,”  is  accepted.1 

Questions  have  often  arisen  on  the  meaning  of  the 
words  which  bring  together  in  the  Gospel  history  the 
names  of  Abraham  and  of  the  true  and  final  Heir  of 
Abraham’s  promises.  But  to  the  student  of  the  whole 
line  of  the  Sacred  history,  they  may  at  least  be 
allowed  to  express  the  marvellous  continuity  and 
community  of  character,  of  truth,  of  intention,  between 
this,  its  grand  beginning,  and  that,  its  still  grander 
end. 

“  Your  father  Abraham  rejoiced  to  see  My  day ,  and  he 
“saw  it,  and  was  glad”2. 

Note.  To  the  illustrations  of  the  Israelite  History  from  Egypt,  ante ,  p.  48, 
and  post,  p.  85,  may  be  added  some  details  which  can  be  found  in  Brugsch’s 
Egypt,  i.  56  ;  Sharpe’s  History  of  Egypt,  book  ii.  §  16  ;  Bunsen’s  Egypt,  v. 
.511,  545,  561  ;  as  also  the  new  light  thrown  upon  the  Temples  of  the  Sun 
(as  given  in  Lecture  IV.  96)  by  the  complete  excavation  of  the  Temple  of 
Edfou. 


1  Heb.  x.  5,  7. 


2  John  viii.  39,  56,  58. 


Lect  III. 


JACOB. 


57 


LECTURE  m. 

JACOB. 

"Abraham  was  a  hero,  Jacob  was  ‘a  plain  man, 
"  dwelling  in  tents.’  Abraham  we  feel  to  be  Contrast  of 

°  Abraham 

"  above  ourselves,  Jacob  to  be  like  ourselves.”  and  Jacob. 
So  the  distinction  between  the  two  great  Patriarchs 
has  been  drawn  out  by  a  celebrated  theologian.1 
"  Few  and  evil  have  the  days  of  the  years  of  my  life  been , 
"  and  have  not  attained  unto  the  days  of  the  years  of  the 
"  life  of  my  fathers  in  the  days  of  their  pilgrimage?’  So 
the  experience  of  Israel  himself  is  summed  up  in  the 
close  of  his  life.  Human  cares,  jealousies,  sorrows,  cast 
their  shade  over  the  scene  —  the  golden  dawn  of  the 
Patriarchal  age  is  overcast :  there  is  no  longer  the 
same  unwavering  faith;  we  are  no  longer  in  com¬ 
munion  with  the  "High  Father,”  the  "Friend  of  God;”2 

we  at  times  almost  doubt  whether  we  are  not  with  His 

0 

enemy.  But  for  this  very  reason  the  interest  attach¬ 
ing  to  Jacob,  though  of  a  less  lofty  and  universal 
kind,  is  more  touching,  more  penetrating,  more  at¬ 
tractive.  Nothing  but  the  perverse  attempt  to  demand 
perfection  of  what  is  held  before  us  as  imperfect  could 
blind  us  to  the  exquisite  truthfulness  which  marks  the 
delineation  of  the  Patriarch’s  character. 

1  Newman’s  Sermons,  v.  91.  his  birthright  (Beer’s  Leben  Abra- 

2  It  is  a  striking  legend  that  Abra-  hams,  84). 
ham  died  on  the  day  that  Esau  sold 


58 


JACOB. 


lect.  m 


I.  Look  at  him,  as  his  course  is  unrolled  through 
the  long  vicissitudes  which  make  his  life  a  faithful 
mirror  of  human  existence  in  its  most  varied  aspects. 
Characters  Look  at  him,  as  compared  with  his  brother 

of  Jacob  .  1  . 

and  Esau.  Esau.  Unlike  the  sharp  contrast  of  the  earlier 
pairs  of  Sacred  history,  in  these  two  the  good  and 
evil  are  so  mingled,  that  at  first  we  might  be  at  a 
loss  which  to  follow,  which  to  condemn.  The  distinct¬ 
ness  with  which  they  seem  to  stand  and  move  before 
us  against  the  horizon  of  the  clear  distance  is  a  new 
phase  in  the  history.  Esau,  the  shaggy  red-haired1 
huntsman,  the  man  of  the  field,  with  his  arrows,  his 
quiver,  and  his  bow,  coming  in  weary  from  the  chase, 
caught,  as  with  the  levity  and  eagerness  of  a  child, 
by  the  sight  of  the  lentil  soup,  —  “Feed  me,  I  pray 
“thee,  with  the  ‘red,  red’2  pottage,”  —  yet  so  full  of 
generous  impulse,  so  affectionate  towards  his  aged  fa¬ 
ther,  so  forgiving  towards  his  brother,  so  open-handed, 
so  chivalrous :  who  has  not  at  times  felt  his  heart 
warm  towards  the  poor  rejected  Esau ;  and  been  tempt¬ 
ed  to  join  with  him  as  he  cries  with  “  a  great  and  ex- 
“  ceeding  bitter  cry,”  “  Hast  thou  but  one  blessing,  my 
“  father  ?  bless  me,  even  me  also,  0  my  father !  ” 
And  who  does  not  in  like  manner  feel  at  times  his 
indignation  swell  against  the  younger  brother  ?  “  Is 

“he  not  rightly  named  Jacob,  for  he  hath  supplanted 
“  me  these  two  times  ?  ”  He  entraps  his  brother,  he 
deceives  his  father,  he  makes  a  bargain  even  in  his 
prayer ;  in  his  dealings  with  Laban,  in  his  meeting 

1  Emu  (hairy)  Arabic  word.  “  As  horse  (Zech.  i.  8  ;  vi.  2).  So  also  of 
if  with  a  cloak  of  hair  (Adrath  Seir).”  lentils  (Gen.  xxv.  30),  or  blood  (Isa. 
—  Zech.  xiii.  4.  Edmoni  ( LXX.  7ru/5-  lxiii.  2).  Compare  Scott’s  description 
patois')  is  “  red-haired”  here,  and  in  of  “  Rob  Roy”  (ch.  7). 
speaking  of  David.  Edom  (red),  as  of  2  Gen.  xxv.  30  (in  the  original) 
the  hair  of  a  cow  (Num.  xix.  2),  or 


Lect.  III. 


CONTRAST  WITH  ESAU. 


59 


with  Esau,  he  still  calculates  and  contrives;  he  dis¬ 
trusts  his  neighbors,  he  regards  with  prudential  in¬ 
difference  the  insult  to  his  daughter,  and  the  cruelty 
of  his  sons ;  he  hesitates  to  receive  the  assurance  of 
Joseph’s  good-will ;  he  repels,  even  in  his  lesser  traits, 

the  free  confidence  that  we  cannot  withhold  from  the 

^  * 

Patriarchs  of  the  elder  generation. 

But  yet,  taking  the  two  from  first  to  last,  how 
entirely  is  the  judgment  of  Scripture  and  the  judg¬ 
ment  of  posterity  confirmed  by  the  result  of  the 
whole.  The  mere  impulsive  hunter  vanishes  away, 
light  as  air :  “  he  did  eat  and  drink,  and  rose  up, 
“and  went  his  way.  Thus  Esau  despised  his  birth- 
bright.”  The  substance,  the  strength  of  the  Chosen 
family,  the  true  inheritance  of  the  promise  of  Abra¬ 
ham,  was  interwoven  with  the  very  essence  of  the 
character  of  “the  plain1  man,  dwelling  in  tents,” 
steady,  persevering,  moving  onward  with  deliberate 
settled  purpose,  through  years  of  suffering  and  of 
prosperity,  of  exile  and  return,  of  bereavement  and 
recovery.  The  birthright  is  always  before  him.  Ba- 
chael  is  won  from  Laban  by  hard  service,  “  and  the 
“seven  years  seemed  unto  him  but  a  few  days  for 
“the  love  he  had  to  her.”  Isaac,  and  Bebekah,  and 
Bebekah’s  nurse,  are  remembered  with  a  faithful,  filial 
remembrance ;  Joseph  and  Benjamin  are  long  and 
passionately  loved  with  a  more  than  parental  affec¬ 
tion, —  bringing  down  his  gray  hairs  for  their  sakes 
“in  sorrow  to  the  grave”  This  is  no  character  to 
be  contemned  or  scoffed  at;  if  it  was  encompassed 
with  much  infirmity,  yet  its  very  complexity  demands 

1  Gen.  xxv.  27.  The  word  trans-  has  softened,  probably  from  a  sense 
lated  “  plain  ”  implies  a  stronger  ap-  of  the  difficulty, 
probation,  which  the  English  Version 


60 


JACOB. 


Lect.  III. 


our  reverent  attention;  in  it  are  bound  up,  as  his 
double  name  expresses,  not  one  man,  but  two  ;  by 
toil  and  struggle,  Jacob,  the  Supplanter,  is  gradually 
transformed  into  Israel,  the  Prince  of  God ;  the  harsher 
and  baser  features  are  softened  and  purified  away:  he 
looks  back  over  his  long  career  with  the  fulness  of 
experience  and  humility.  “  I  am  not  worthy  of  the 
“  least  of  all  the  mercies  and  of  all  the  truth  which 
“  Thou  hast  shown  unto  Thy  servant.” 1  Alone  of  the 
Patriarchal  family,  his  end  is  recorded  as  invested  with 
the  solemnity  of  warning  and  of  prophetic  song. 
“  Gather  yourselves  together,  ye  sons  of  Jacob ;  and 
“hearken  unto  Israel  your  father.”  We  need  not  fear 
to  acknowledge  that  the  God  of  Abraham  and  the 
God  of  Isaac  was  also  the  God  of  Jacob. 

Most  unworthy  indeed  we  should  be  of  the  gift  of 
Esau  the  Sacred  narrative,  if  we  failed  to  appre- 

th^Edom-  °ia^e  in  this,  its  full,  its  many-sided  aspect, 
ites;  jn  ^he  Jewish  history,  what  a  foreshadowing 
of  the  future  !  We  may  even  venture  to  trace  in  the 
wayward  chieftain  of  Edom  the  likeness  of  the  fickle, 
uncertain  Edomite,  now  allied,  now  hostile  to  the  seed 
of  promise  ;  the  wavering,  unstable  dynasty  which  came 
forth  from  Idumaea,  Herod  the  magnificent  and  the 
cruel;  Herod  Antipas,  who  “heard  John  gladly”  and 
slew  him  ;  Herod  Agrippa,  “  almost  a  Christian  ” —  half 
Jew  and  half  heathen.  “  A  turbulent  and  unruly  race,” 
so  Josephus  describes  the  Idumaeans  of  his  day :  “  al- 
“  ways  hovering  on  the  verge  of  revolution,  always 
“  rejoicing  in  changes,  roused  to  arms  by  the  slightest 
“  motion  of  flattery,  rushing  to  battle  as  if  they  wrere 
“  going  to  a  feast  ”2  But  we  cannot  mistake  the  type  of 
the  Israelites  in  him  whom,  beyond  even  Abraham  and 

2  Josephus,  B.  J.  iv.  4,  1. 


1  Gen.  xxxii.  10. 


Lect.  III. 


CONTRAST  WITH  ESAU. 


61 


Isaac,  they  recognized  as  their  father  Israel.1  His  doubt¬ 
ful  qualities  exactly  recall  to  us  the  meanness  of  Jacob  of 
character,  which,  even  to  a  proverb,  we  call  in  the  Jews- 
scorn  “  Jewish?  By  his  peculiar  discipline  of  exile  and 
suffering,  a  true  counterpart  is  produced  of  the  special 
faults  and  special  gifts,  known  to  us  chiefly  through  his 
persecuted  descendants  in  the  Middle  Ages.  Professor 
Blunt  has  with  much  ingenuity  pointed  out  how  Jacob 
seems  to  have  “  learned  like  maltreated  animals  to  have 
u  the  fear  of  man  habitually  before  his  eyes.”2  In 
Jacob  we  see  the  same  timid,  cautious  watchfulness  that 
we  know  so  well,  though  under  darker  colors,  through 
our  great  masters  of  fiction,  in  Shylock  of  Yenice  and 
Isaac  of  York.  But  no  less,  in  the  nobler  side  of  his 
career,  do  we  trace  the  germs  of  the  unbroken  endur¬ 
ance,  the  undying  resolution,  which  keeps  the  nation 
alive  still  even  in  its  present  outcast  condition,  and 
which  was  the  basis,  in  its  brighter  days,  of  the  heroic 
zeal,  long-suffering,  and  hope,  of  Moses,  of  David,  of 
Jeremiah,  of  the  Maccabees,  of  the  twelve  Jewish 
Apostles,  and  the  first  martyr,  Stephen. 

We  cannot,  however,  narrow  the  lessons  of  Jacob’s 
history  to  the  limits  of  the  Israelite  Church.  All 
Ecclesiastical  History  is  the  gainer  by  the  sight  of 
such  a  character  so  delineated.  It  is  a  character  not 
all  black  nor  all  white,  but  checkered  with  the  mixed 
colors  which  make  up  so  vast  a  proportion  of  the 
double  phases  of  the  leaders  of  the  Church  and  world 
m  every  age.  The  force  of  the  Scripture  Examples 

.  .  .  .  .  .  of  mixed 

narrative  may  be  seen  by  its  contrast  with  the  characters. 

1  Hos.  xii.  3,4,5,12.  Once  only  “  proventus  majoribus  suis  clariorem 
Jacob  is  mentioned  in  Pagan  records ;  “  fecit.”  —  Justin ,  xxxvi.  2. 

“  Post  Damascum  Azelus,  mox  Adores,  2  Veracity  of  the  Books  of  Moses, 
“  et  Abraham,  et  Israhel  reges  fuere.  ch.  viii. 

“  Sed  Israhelem  felix  decern  filiorum 


62 


JACOB. 


Lect.  III. 


dark  hues  in  which  Esau  is  painted  by  the  Rabbinical 
authors.1  He  is  hindered  in  his  chase  by  Satan ;  Hell 
opens  as  he  goes  in  to  his  father;  he  gives  his  father 
dog’s  flesh  instead  of  venison  ;  he  tries  to  bite  Jacob 
on  his  return ;  he  commits  five  sins  in  one  day.  This 
is  the  difference  between  mere  national  animosity  and 
the  high  impartial  judgment  of  the  Sacred  story,  evenly 
balanced  and  steadily  held,  yet  not  regardless  of  the 
complicated  and  necessary  variations  of  human  thought 
and  action.  For  students  of  theology,  for  future  pas¬ 
tors,  for  young  men  in  the  opening  of  life,  what  a  series 
of  lessons,  were  this  the  place  to  enlarge  upon  it,  is 
opened  in  the  history  of  those  two  youths,  issuing  from 
their  father’s  tent  in  Beersheba  !  The  free,  easy,  frank 
good-nature  of  the  profane  Esau  is  not  overlooked ;  the 
craft,  duplicity,  timidity,  of  the  religious  Jacob  is  duly 
recorded.  Yet,  on  the  one  hand,  fickleness,  unsteadi¬ 
ness,  weakness,  want  of  faith  and  want  of  principle,  ruin 
and  render  useless  the  noble  qualities  of  the  first ;  and 
on  the  other  hand,  steadfast  purpose,  resolute  sacrifice 
of  present  to  future,  fixed  principle,  purify,  elevate,  turn 
to  lasting  good  even  the  baser  qualities  of  the  second. 
And,  yet  again,  whether  in  the  two  brothers  or  their 
descendants,  we  see  how  in  each  the  good  or  evil  strove 
together  and  worked  their  results  almost  to  the  end. 
Esau  and  his  race  cling  still  to  the  outskirts  of  the 
Chosen  People.  “  Meddle  not,”  it  was  said  in  after¬ 
times,  “  with  your  brethren  the  children  of  Esau,  for  I 
“  will  not  give  you  of  their  land,  because  I  have  given 
“  Mount  Seir 2  to  Esau  for  a  possession.”  Israel,  on  the 
other  hand,  is  outcast,  thwarted,  deceived,  disappointed, 
bereaved, — u  all  these  things  are  against  me  in  him, 
and  in  his  progeny  also,  the  curse  of  Ebal  is  always 

1  Otho,  Lex.  Rabb.  207.  a  Deut.  ii.  5. 


Lect.  III. 


HIS  WANDERINGS. 


63 


blended  with  the  blessings  of  Gerizim.  Remember 
these  mingled  warnings  as  we  become  entangled  in  the 
web  of  the  history  of  the  wdiole  Church.  How  hardly 
Esau  was  condemned,  how  hardly  Jacob  was  saved. 
We  are  kept  in  long  and  just  suspense;  the  prodigal 
may,  as  far  as  human  eye  can  see,  be  on  his  way 
home  ;  the  blameless  son,  who  “  has  been  in  his  father’s 
house  always,”  may  be  shutting  himself  out.  Yet  the 
final  issue,  to  which  on  the  whole  this  primitive  history 
calls  our  attention,  is  the  same  which  is  borne  out  by 
the  history  of  the  Church  even  in  these  later  days  of 
complex  civilization.  There  is,  after  all,  a  weakness  in 
selfish  worldliness,  for  which  no  occasional  impulse  can 
furnish  any  adequate  compensation,  even  though  it  be 
the  generosity  of  an  Arabian  chief,  or  the  inimitable 
good-nature  of  an  English  king.  There  is  a  nobleness 
in  principle  and  in  faith  which  cannot  be  wholly  de¬ 
stroyed,  even  though  it  be  marred  by  the  hardness  or 
the  duplicity  of  the  Jew,  or  the  Jesuit,  or  the  Puritan. 

II.  Let  us  now  follow  the  Patriarch  through  the  suc¬ 
cessive  scenes  of  his  life  ;  again,  as  in  the  case  of  Abrar 
ham,  dwelling  upon  those  special  points  which  admit 
of  geographical  or  historical  elucidation,  or  general 
application  of  ecclesiastical  and  spiritual  truth. 

1.  “And  Jacob  went  out  from  Beersheba,  and  went 
“  toward  Haran.”  It  is,  if  one  may  so  say,  the  Jacob  at 
first  retrograde  movement  in  the  history  ofBetheL 
the  Church.  Was  the  migration  of  Abraham  to  be 
reversed  ?  Was  the  westward  tide  of  events  to  roll 
back  upon  itself?  Was  the  Chosen  Race  to  sink  back 
into  the  life  of  the  Mesopotamian  deserts  ?  The  first 
halt  of  the  Wanderer  revealed  his  future  destinies. 
“  The  sun  went  down ;  ”  the  night  gathered  round ; 
he  was  on  the  central  thoroughfare,  on  the  hard 


64 


JACOB. 


Lect.  III. 


backbone 1  of  the  mountains  of  Palestine ;  the  ground 
was  strewn  with  wide  sheets  of  bare  rock ;  here  and 
there  stood  up  isolated  fragments,  like  ancient  Druidical 
monuments.  On  the  hard  ground  he  lay  down  for 
rest,  and  in  the  visions  of  the  night  the  rough  stones 
formed  themselves  into  a  vast  staircase,  reaching  into 
the  depth  of  the  wide  and  open  sky,  which,  without 
any  interruption  of  tent  or  tree,  was  stretched  over  the 
sleeper’s  head.  On  that  staircase  were  seen  ascending 
and  descending  the  messengers  of  God  ;  and  from  above 
there  came  the  Divine  Voice  which  told  the  houseless 
wanderer  that,  little  as  he  thought  it,  he  had  a  Pro¬ 
tector  there  and  everywhere ;  that  even  in  this  bare 
and  open  thoroughfare,  in  no  consecrated  grove  or  cave, 
“  the  Lord  was  in  this  place,  though  he  knew  it  not.” 
“  This  was  Bethel,  the  House  of  God ;  and  this  was  the 
“  gate  of  Heaven.” 

The  monument,  whatever  it  was,  that  was  still  in 
after-ages  ascribed  to  the  erection  of  Jacob,  must  have 
been,  like  so  many  described  or  seen  in  other  times 
and  countries,  a  rude  copy  of  the  natural  features  of 
the  place,  as  at  Carnac  in  Brittany,  the  cromlechs  of 
Wales  and  Cornwall,  or  the  walls  of  Tiryns,  where 
the  play  of  nature  and  the  simplicity  of  art  are 
almost  indistinguishable.  In  all  ages  of  primitive  his¬ 
tory  such  monuments  are,  if  we  may  so  call  them,  the 
earliest  ecclesiastical  edifices.  In  Greece  there  were 
rude  stones  at  Delphi,  still  visible  in  the  second  cen¬ 
tury,  anterior  to  any  temple,  and,  like  the  rock  of 
Bethel,  anointed2  with  oil  by  the  pilgrims  who  came 
thither.  In  Northern  Africa,  Arnobius,  after  his  con¬ 
version,  describes  the  kind  of  fascination  which  had 
drawn  him  towards  one  of  those  aged  stones, 

1  See  Smai  and  Palestine ,  220.  2  Paus.  vii.  22 ;  x.  24. 


Lect.  III. 


HIS  WANDERINGS. 


65 


streaming  and  shining  with  the  sacred  oil  which 
had  been1  poured  upon  it.  The  black  stone  of  the 
Arabian  Caaba  reaches  back  to  the  remotest  antiquity 
of  which  history  or  tradition  can  speak. 

In  all  these  rough  anticipations  of  a  fixed  structure 
or  building,  we  trace  the  beginnings  of  what  in  the 
case  of  Jacob  is  first  distinctly  called  “Beth-el,”  the 
house  of  God,  “  the  place  of  worship  ”  —  the  “  Beit- 
allah”  of  Mecca,  the  “Baetulia”  of  the  early  Phoeni¬ 
cian  worship.  When  we  see  the  rude  remains  of 
Abury  in  our  own  country,  there  is  a  strange  interest 
in  the  thought  that  they  were  the  first  architectural 
witness  of  English  religion.  Even  so  the  pillar  or 
cairn  or  cromlech  of  Bethel  must  have  been  looked 
upon  by  the  Israelites,  and  may  still  be  looked  upon 
in  thought  by  us,  as  the  precursor  of  every  a  House 
of  God,”  that  has  since  arisen  in  the  Jewish  and 
Christian  world  —  the  temple,  the  cathedral,  the 
church,  the  chapel;  nay  more,  of  those  secret  places 
of  worship  that  are  marked  by  no  natural  beauty  and 
seen  by  no  human  eye  —  the  closet,  the  catacomb, 
the  thoroughfare,  of  the  true  worshipper.  There  was 
neither  in  the  aspect  nor  in  the  ground  of  Bethel 
any  “  Religio  loci ,”  but  the  place  was  no  less  “  dreadful,” 
“  full  of  awe.”  The  stone2  of  Bethel  remained  as  the 
memorial  that  an  all-encompassing  Providence  watches 
over  its  chosen  instruments,  however  unconscious  at 
the  time  of  what  and  where  they  are.  “  The  Shep¬ 
herd  of  the  stone  of  Israel”  was  one  of  the  earliest 

1  Arnobius  adv.  Gent.  i.  39.  He  (Tac.  Hist.  ii.  2 ;  Herod,  v.  3 ;  Gese- 

speaks  also  (vi.  11)  of  the  special  nius,  Mon.  Phcen.  387)  refers  rather 
worship  of  “  informes  lapides  ”  by  the  to  their  being  thought  the  habitations 
Arabs.  of  the  Deity. 

2  The  worship  of  meteoric  stones 

9 


# 


66 


JACOB. 


Lect.  III. 


names  by  which  “  the  God  of  Jacob  ”  was  known.1 
The  vision  of  the  ascending  and  descending  messen¬ 
gers  received  its  highest  application  in  a  Divine  mani¬ 
festation,  yet  more  universal  and  unexpected.2 

2.  The  chief  interest  of  the  story  of  Jacob’s  twenty 
Jacob  in  years’  service  with  Laban  lies  in  its  reopening 
mia.°pota  of  the  relations  between  the  settlers  in  Pales¬ 
tine  and  the  original  tribe  of  Mesopotamia,  which 
appeared  on  Abraham’s  migration  to  have  been  closed. 
These  chapters  are  an  instance  of  the  compensation 
which  is  constantly  going  on  in  the  losses  and  gains 
of  theological  study.  If  a  shade  of  uncertainty  is 
thrown  here  and  there  over  the  meaning  and  nature 
of  the  narrative,  which  a  hundred  or  a  thousand  years 
ago  would  not  have  occurred;  yet,  on  the  other  hand, 
with  how  far  deeper  a  pleasure  than  in  any  preceding 
age  do  we  enter  into  the  beauty  of  those  primitive 
scenes.  We  are  more  than  interested;  we  are  re¬ 
freshed;  we  are  edified;  we  become  again  like  little 
children,  as  that  pastoral  life  rises  before  our  own 
worn-out  time.  Like  the  aged  patriarch,  “  whose  eyes 
“  were  dim  that  he  could  not  see,”  and  who  “  longed 
“  for  the  savoury  meat  that  he  loved,  that  he  might 
“  eat  it  before  he  died,”  we  too  in  the  haze  of  many 
centuries  which  surrounds  our  vision,  “  smell  the  smell 
“  of  the  raiment  ”  of  those  ancient  chiefs,  and  we  bless 
them,  and  we  feel  that  it  is  “as  the  smell  of  a  field 
“which  the  Lord  hath  blessed,”  full  of  the  dew  of 
heaven  and  of  the  fatness  of  the  virgin  earth. 

“  Then  Jacob  ‘  lifted  up  his  feet  ’  and  came  into  the 
“  land  of  ‘  the  children  ’  of  the  East.  And  he  looked, 
“  and  behold  a  well  in  the  field ;  and  lo  !  three  flocks 

1  Gen.  xlix.  24.  Ewald,  Geschichte,  i.  523,  note.  2  John  i.  51. 


Lect.  III. 


HIS  WANDERINGS. 


67 


“  of  sheep  lying  by  it,  and  a  great  stone  was  on  the 
“  well’s  mouth.”  The  shepherds  were  there ;  they  had 
advanced  far  away  from  “  the  city  of  Nahor.”  It  was 
not  the  well  outside  the  walls,  with  the  hewn  stair¬ 
case,  down  which  Rebekah  descended  with  the  pitcher 
on  her  head.  Rachel 1  comes,  guiding  her  father’s 
flocks,  like  the  daughters  of  the  Bedouin  chiefs  at 
the  present  day;  and  Jacob  claims  the  Bedouin  right 
of  cousinship  :  “  And  it  came  to  pass  when  Jacob  saw 
“  Rachel,  the  daughter  of  Laban,  his  mother’s  brother, 
a  and  the  sheep  of  Laban,  his  mother’s  brother  [ob- 
66  serve  the  simplicity  of  the  juxtaposition],  that  Jacob 
“  went  near  and  rolled  the  stone  from  the  well’s  mouth, 
“  and  watered  the  flock  of  Laban  his  mother’s  brother ; 
“  and  Jacob  kissed  Rachel,  and  lifted  up  his  voice  and 
“  wept.”  Everything  which  follows  is  of  the  same 
color.  Bethuel,  the  aged  head  of  the  family  in  Re- 
bekah’s  time,  is  dead ;  and  Laban  has  succeeded,  the 
true  type  of  the  hard-hearted,  grasping  Sheik  of  an 
Arabian  tribe ;  Laban,  the  ordinary  likeness  of  one 
side  of  the  Arabian  character,  as  Esau  is  of  the  other. 
Then  begins  the  long  contest  of  cunning  and  perse¬ 
verance,  in  which  true  love  wins  the  game  at  last 
against  selfish  gain.  Seven  years,  the  service  of  a 
slave,  thrice  over,  did  Jacob  pay.  He  is  the  faithful 
Eastern  66  good  shepherd ;  ”  “  that  which  was  torn  of 
“  beasts  he  brought  not  unto  his  master ;  he  bare  the 
“  loss  of  it ;  of  his  hand  ”  did  his  hard  taskmaster 
“  require  it,  whether  stolen  by  day  or  stolen  by  night ; 
a  in  the  day  the  drought  ”  of  the  desert  “  consumed 
“  him,  and  the  frost  ”  in  the  cold  Eastern  nights  ;  “  and 

1  The  spring  at  Orfa  was  pointed  “  seven  years  lie  served  his  uncle  La- 
out  by  Jews,  Turks,  and  Armenians  “ban  for  fair  and  beautiful  Rachel.” 
as  Jacob’s  well,  where  “for  twice  —  Travels ,  in  Harleian  Coll.  i.  716. 


68 


JACOB. 


Lect.  III. 


Jacob  at 
Gilead. 


“  his  sleep  departed  from  him.”  In  Edessa,  as  we  have 
seen,  was  laid  up  for  many  centuries  what  professed 
to  he  the  tent  in  which  he  had  guarded  his  master’s 
flocks.  And  at  last  his  fortunes  were  built  up ;  the 
slave  became  a  prince ;  and  the  second  mi¬ 
gration  took  place  from  Mesopotamia  into 
Palestine,  “with  much  cattle,  ‘with  male  and  female 
“  c  slaves,’  with  camels  and  with  asses.” 1  The  hour 
was  come.  As  in  the  earlier  flight  of  Abraham  from 
the  same  region,  the  double  motive  is  put  before  us : 
“And  Jacob  beheld  the  countenance  of  Laban,  and 
“  behold  it  was  not  towards  him  as  before.”  “  And  the 
“Lord  said  unto  Jacob,  Return  unto  the  land  of  thy 
“  fathers  and  to  thy  kindred,  and  I  will  be  with  thee.” 2 
“He  rose  up,”  and  once  again  high  upon  the  backs 
of  camels  he  set  his  sons  and  his  wives,  and  he  fled 
with  all  that  he  had;  and  Rachel  stole  the  teraphim, 
the  household  gods  of  her  family ;  and  “  he  rose  up 
“  and  passed  over  the  ”  great  “  river,  and  set  his  face  ” 
—  not,  as  Abraham,  towards  Damascus,  —  but  right 
away  to  the  south-west,  to  the  long  range  of  Gilead, 
the  line  of  heights  on  the  east  of  the  Jordan  which 


stand  as  outposts  between  Palestine  and  the  Assyrian 
desert.  On  the  seventh  day  the  pursuers  overtook 
the  fugitives.  On  the  undulating  downs  of  Gilead  the 
two  lines  of  tents  were  pitched;  and  in  the  midst  of 
the  encampment  of  Jacob  rose  the  five  tents  of  him¬ 
self  and  of  his  wives,  the  camels  and  the  cattle  moored 
around,  the  seats  and  furniture  of  the  camels  stowed 
within  the  covering  of  the  tents.  As  in  later  times, 
the  fortress  on  these  heights  of  Gilead  became  the 
frontier  post  of  Israel  against  the  Aramaic  tribe  that 
occupied  Damascus,  so  now  the  same  line  of  heights 

2  Gen.  xxxi.  2,  3. 


1  Gen.  xxx.  43. 


Lect.  III. 


HIS  RETURN. 


69 


became  the  frontier  between  the  nation  in  its  youth 
and  the  older  Aramaic  family  of  Mesopotamia.  As 
now  the  confines  of  two  Arab  tribes  are  marked  by  the 
rude  cairn  or  pile  of  stones  erected  at  the  boundary 
of  their  respective  territories,  so  the  pile  of  stones 
and  the  tower  or  pillar  erected  by  the  two  tribes  of 
Jacob1  and  Laban,  marked  that  the  natural  limit  of 
the  range  of  Gilead  should  be  their  actual  limit  also. 
“  The  God  of  Abraham  and  the  God  of  Nahor  ”  — 
here  for  the  first  and  last  time  mentioned  together  — 
“was  to  judge  betwixt  them.”  The  variation  of  the 
dialects  of  the  two  tribes  appears  also  for  the  first 
and  last  time  in  the  two  names  of  the  memorial.  The 
sacrificial  feast  of  the  covenant  was  made  on  the 
mountain-top  ;  “  And  early  in  the  morning  Laban  rose 
“  up  and  kissed  his  sons  and  his  daughters,  and  blessed 
“  them ;  and  Laban  departed,  and  returned  to  his 
“  place ;  ”  and  in  him  and  his  tribe,  as  they  sweep 
out  of  sight  into  the  Eastern  Desert,  we  lose  the  last 
trace  of  the  connection  of  Israel  with  the  Chaldsean 
Ur  or  the  Mesopotamian  Haran. 

3.  It  was  the  termination  also  of  the  dark  and  un¬ 
certain  prelude  of  Jacob’s  life.  The  original  j  b 
sin,  the  exile,  the  transgression  in  which  the  Mahanaim- 
founder  of  the  Israelites  was  born  and  bred,  was  held 
up  always  before  their  eyes,  a  mixed  ground  of  warning 
and  thanksgiving.  “  Thy  first  father  hath  sinned.” 2 
“  Thou  wast  called  a  transgressor  from  the  womb.”3 
“  Thou  shalt  say,  A  Syrian  ready  to  perish  was  my 
u  father  ”  4  But  this  is  now  over.  Every  incident  and 
expression  in  the  Sacred  narrative  tends  to  fix  our 
attention  on  this  point  of  the  Patriarch’s  story,  as  the 


1  Gen.  xxxi.  47,  48,  49. 

2  Isa.  xliii.  27. 


3  Isa.  xlviii.  8. 

4  Deut.  xxvi.  5. 


70 


JACOB. 


Lect.  Ill 


climax  and  turn  of  the  whole.  He  is  the  exile  return¬ 
ing  home  after  years  of  wandering.  He  is  the  chief, 
raised  by  his  own  efforts  and  God’s  providence  to  a 
high  place  amongst  the  tribes  of  the  earth.  He  stands 
like  Abraham  on  the  heights  of  Bethel ;  like  Moses  on 
the  heights  of  Pisgali;  overlooking  from  the  watch- 
tower,  “  the  Mizpeh”  of  Gilead,  the  whole  extent  of 
the  land  which  was  to  be  called  after  his  name.  The 
deep  valley  of  the  Jordan,  stretched  below,  recalls  the 
mighty  change  of  fortune.  “  With  my  staff  I  passed 
“  over  this  Jordan,  and  now  I  am  become  two  hands.” 
The  wide  descent  of  the  valley  southward  towards  the 
distant  mountains  of  Seir  reminds  him  of  the  contest 
which  may  be  in  store  for  him  from  the  advancing  tribe 
of  his  brother  of  Edom.  But  the  story  sets  before  us  a 
deeper  than  any  mere  external  change  or  struggle.  It 
is  as  though  the  twenty  years  of  exile  and  servitude 
had  wrought  their  work.  Every  incident  and  word  is 
fraught  with  a  double  meaning ;  in  every  instance 
earthly  and  spiritual  images  are  put  one  over  against 
the  other,  hardly  to  be  seen  in  the  English  version, 
but  in  the  original  clearly  intended.  Other  forms 
than  his  own  company  are  surrounding  him ;  another 
Face  than  that  of  his  brother1  Esau  is  to  welcome  his 
return  to  the  land  of  his  birth  and  kindred.  He  was 
become  two  “bands”  or  “hosts;”  he  had  divided  his 
people,  his  flocks  and  herds  and  camels  into  two 
“hosts;”  he  had  sent  “messengers”  before  to  an¬ 
nounce  his  approach.  But  “  as  Jacob  went  on  his  way 
“the  ‘ messengers’  of  God  met  him;”  as  when  he  had 

1  “  Afterward  I  will  see  his  (Esau’s)  “  face  to  face,”  xxxii.  30.  “  I  have 

“  face.”  —  Gen.  xxxii.  20.  Jacob  “  seen  thy  face  (Esau’s)  as  though  I 
called  the  name  of  the  place  “  the  “  had  seen  the  face  of  God,”  xxxiii. 
‘  Face  of  God  :  for  I  have  seen  God  10. 


Lect.  III. 


HIS  RETURN. 


71 


seen  them  ascending  and  descending  the  stair  of  heaven 
at  Bethel;  and  “when  Jacob  saw  them,  he  said,  This 
“  is  God’s  host :  and  he  called  the  name  of  that  place 
“Mahanaim  that  is,  “  The  Two  Hosts.”  The  Jac(,bat 
name  was  handed  on  to  after-ages,  and  the  PemeL 
place  became  the  sanctuary  of  the  Transjordanic  tribes. 
He  was  still  on  the  heights  of  the  Transjordanic  hills, 
beyond  the  deep  defile  where  the  Jabbok,  as  its  name 
implies,  “  wrestles  ”  with  the  mountains  through  which 
it  descends  to  the  Jordan.  In  the  dead  of  night  he 
sent  his  wives  and  sons  and  all  that  he  had,  across 
the  defile,  and  he  was  left  alone ;  and  in  the  darkness 
and  stillness,  in  the  crisis  of  his  life,  in  the  agony  of 
his  fear  for  the  issue  of  the  morrow,  there  “wrestled” 
with  him  One  whose  name  he  knew  not,  until  the 
dawn  rose  over  the  hills  of  Gilead.  They  “  wrestled,” 
and  he  prevailed;  yet  not  without  bearing  away  the 
marks  of  the  conflict.1  He  is  saved,  as  els'ewhere,  in 
his  whole  career,  so  here ;  “  saved,  yet  so  as  by  fire.” 
In  that  struggle,  in  that  seal  and  crown  of  his  life,  he 
wins  his  new  name.2  “Thy  name  shall  be  called  no 
“more  Jacob  (f  The  Supplanter ’),  but  Israel  (‘  The 
“  Prince  of  God  ’),  for  as  a  prince  hast  thou  power  with 
“  God  and  with  man,  and  hast  prevailed.”  The  dark 
crafty  character  of  the  youth,  though  never  wholly 
lost — for  “Jacob”  he  still  is  called  even  to  the  end 
of  his  days  —  has  been  by  trial  and  affliction  changed 
into  the  prince-like,  godlike  character  of  his  manhood. 
And  what  was  He  with  whom  he  had  wrestled  in  the 
visions  of  the  night,  and  who  vanished  from  his  grasp 
as  the  day  was  breaking  ?  “  Tell  me,  I  pray  thee, 

1  Like  the  thorn  in  the  flesh,  2  Cor.  play  on  the  word  sarah ,  “  to  be  a 
xii.  7  (Evvald,  i.  461,  note).  prince”  and  also  “  to  fight”  (Gese- 

2 “ Israel"  seems  to  be  a  double  uius,  Thes.  1338). 


72 


JACOB. 


LEcr.  Ill 


“ thy  name.  And  He  said,  6  Wherefore  is  it  that  thou 
“  dost  ask  after  My  name?’  And  He  blessed  him 
“  there.  And  Jacob  called  the  name  of  the  place 
“  Peniel  (that  is,  6  The  Face  of  God’); — for  I  have 
“  seen  God  face  to  face,  and  my  life  is  preserved. 
“  And  as  he  passed  over  Penuel,  the  sun,”  of  which 
the  dawn  had  been  already  breaking,  burst’  upon 
“  him ;  and  he  halted  upon  his  thigh.” 1 

Many  memorials,  outward  and  inward,  remain  of 
that  vision.  “  The  children  of  Israel,”  and  the  children 
of  Abyssinia  also,  “  eat  not  of  the  sinew  which  shrank,2 
“unto  this  day.”  This  was  one  remembrance  traced 
back  to  the  old  ancestral  victory.  Another  was  the 
watch-tower  of  Peniel,  which  years  afterwards  guarded 
the  passes  of  the  Jordan,  when  Gideon3 4  pursued  the 
Midianites  who  were  retreating  back  into  their  eastern 
haunts,  by  the  same  approach  through  which  the  tribe 
of  Jacob  was  now  advancing.  But  a  more  enduring 
memorial  is  the  application,  almost  without  an  alle¬ 
gory,  into  which  that  mysterious  encounter  shapes 
itself,  as  an  image  of  the  like  struggles  and  wrest¬ 
lings,  in  all  ages  of  the  Church,  on  the  eve  of  some 
dreadful  crisis,  in  the  solitude  and  darkness  of  some 
overhanging  trial.  It  was  already  so  understood  in 
part  by  the  Prophets,  —  “  He  had  power  over  the 
“  angel  and  prevailed ;  he  wept  and  made  supplication 
“ unto  him!' 4  And  in  modern  times  this  aspect  of  the 


1  The  moral  aspects  of  this  story 
are  well  brought  out  by  Mr.  Robert¬ 
son  ( Sermons ,  i.  40). 

2  The  Jews  abstain  on  this  account 
from  the  backs  of  animals.  See  Ro- 
senmiiller  ad  loc. 

3  Judges  viii.  8,  0. 

4  Hos.  xii.  4.  The  words  quoted 


in  italics  are  independent  of  the  ac¬ 
count  in  Gen.  xxxii.  27.  Dr.  Wolff 
describes  the  religious  exercises  of 
the  Dervishes  as  resembling  an  actual 
wrestle,  and  conducted  with  such 
vehemence  as  actually  to  dislocate 
their  joints.  —  Travels  and  Adven¬ 
tures,  ch.  xxii. 


Lect.  III. 


HIS  CHANGE. 


73 


story  finds  its  best  application  in  the  noble  hymn  of 
Charles  Wesley : 

“  Come,  O  thou  Traveller  unknown, 

Whom  still  I  hold,  but  cannot  see! 

My  company  before  is  gone, 

And  I  am  left  alone  with  Thee : 

With  Thee  all  night  I  mean  to  stay, 

And  wrestle  till  the  break  of  day. 

•  ••••• 

“  Yield  to  me  now,  for  I  am  weak  ; 

But  confident  in  self-despair  : 

Speak  to  my  heart,  in  blessings  speak : 

Be  conquer’d  by  my  instant  prayer. 

Speak !  or  thou  never  hence  shalt  move, 

And  tell  me  if  thy  Name  be  Love. 

“  My  prayer  hath  power  with  God:  the  grace 
Unspeakable  I  now  receive  ; 

Through  faith  I  see  Thee  face  to  face  — 

I  see  Thee  face  to  face  and  live ! 

In  vain  I  have  not  wept  and  strove  — 

Thy  Nature  and  thy  Name  is  Love.” 


4.  The  dreaded  meeting  with  Esau  has  passed ;  the 
two  brothers  retain  their  characters  through  The  retire- 
the  interview :  the  generosity  of  the  one,  and  Esau, 
the  caution  of  the  other.  And  for  the  last  time 
Esau  retires  to  make  room  for  Jacob ;  he  leaves  to 
him  the  land  of  his  inheritance,  and  disappears  on  his 
way  to  the  wild  mountains  of  Seir.1  In  those  wild 
mountains,  in  the  red  hills  of  Edom,  in  the  caves  and 
excavations  to  which  the  soft  sandstone  rocks  so 
readily  lend  themselves,  in  the  cliffs  which  afterwards 
gave  to  the  settlement  the  name  of  “  Sela  ”  or  “  Petra,” 
lingered  the  ancient  aboriginal  tribe  of  the  Horites2 

1  Seir  =  woody,  hairy.  There  is  Compare  Josh.  xi.  17  ;  xii.  7  ;  Joseph, 
still  the  es-Sherah ,  or  downs,  slightly  Ant.  i.  20,  §  3. 

tufted  and  possibly  contrasted  with  2  «  Seir  ”  and  “  the  Horite  ”  go  to- 
the  bald  mountains  of  Petra  itself,  gether,  Gen.  xxxvi.  20. 

10 


74 


JACOB. 


Lect.  III. 


or  dwellers  in  the  holes  of  the  rock.  These  u  the 
a  children  of  Esau  succeeded,  and  destroyed  from  before 
“  them,  and  dwelt  in  their  stead.” 1  It  was  the  rough 
rocky  country  described  in  their  father’s  blessing :  a 
savage  dwelling,  “  away 2  from  the  fatness  of  the  earth 
“  and  the  dew  of  heaven ;  ”  by  the  sword  they  were 
to  live ;  a  race  of  hunters  among  the  mountains ;  their 
nearest  allies,  the  Arabian  tribe  Nebaioth.3  Together 
dwelt  the  conquering  Edomites  and  the  remnant  of 
the  Horites,  each  under  their  respective  chiefs,4  whose 
names  are  preserved  in  long  lines  down  to  the  time 
of  David.  Petra,  the  mysterious,  secluded  city,  with 
its  thousand  caves,  is  the  lasting  monument  of  their 
local  habitation. 

May  we  not  also  trace  their  connection  with  a 
The  Book  monument  still  more  instructive,  —  the  name 
°f  job.  and  ^e  scene  0f  the  b00k  of  Job  ?  When, 
where,  and  by  whom  that  wonderful  book  was  written, 
we  need  not  here  pause  to  ask.  Yet,  as  we  take 
leave  of  Esau  and  his  race,  we  can  hardly  forbear  to 
notice  the  numerous  traces  which  connect  the  scene 
of  the  story  with  the  land  of  Edom,  with  the  mys¬ 
terious  rocks  of  Petra.  Uz,  Eliphaz,  Teman,  are  all 
names  more  or  less  connected  with  the  Idumsean 
chiefs.  The  description  of  the  aboriginal  tribes,  ex¬ 
pelled  from  their  seats  and  living  in  the  cliffs  and 
caves  of  the  rocks,  well  suits  the  flight  of  the  Horites 
before  the  conquering  Edomites.5  The  description  of 
the  wonders  of  Egypt  —  the  war-horse,  the  hippo- 

1  Deut,  ii.  12,  22.  4  Alluph  =“ox,”  or  “companion,” 

2  This  seems  the  most  probable  almost  always  used  of  Edom ;  trans¬ 

rendering  of  Gen.  xxvii.  39  (see  Ka-  lated  “duke”  (Gen.  xxxvi.  15-19, 
lisch  ad  loc.)  ;  comp.  Jos.  Ant.  i.  18,  21,  29,  30 ;  1  Chron.  i.  51). 

§  7.  5  Job  xxx.  3-8  ;  comp.  Detit.  ii.  22. 

3  Gen.  xxviii.  9 ;  xxxvi.  3. 


Lect.  III. 


THE  SETTLEMENT  AT  SHECHEM. 


75 


potamus,  and  the  crocodile  —  well  suits  the  dweller  in 
Idumsean  Arabia.1  So  the  Septuagint  translators 
understood  even  the  name  of  Job,  as  identical  with 
the  Edomite  Jobab,  and  fixed  his  exact  place  in  the 
history  of  the  tribe.2  Perhaps,  after  all,  the  position 
of  the  story  is  left  in  designed  obscurity.  But  it 
would  be  in  strict  accordance  with  the  tenderness 
which  the  older  Scriptures  exhibit  towards  the  better 
qualities  of  Esau,  that  the  one  book  admitted  into  the 
Sacred  Canon,  of  which  the  subject  is  not  a  member 
of  the  Chosen  People,  shoul-d  bring  before  us  those 
better  qualities  in  their  purest  form,  —  suspected  inno¬ 
cence  frankly  asserting  itself  against  false  religious 
pretensions;  the  generosity  of  the  Patriarchal  chief 
without  his  levity.  “  When  the  ear  heard  him,  then 
“it  blessed  him;  when  the  eye  saw  him,  it  gave 
“witness  to  him.  He  chose  out  their  way,  and  sat 
“chief,  and  dwelt  as  a  king  in  the  army,  as  one  that 
“  comforteth  the  mourners.”  3 

So  we  part  with  the  house  of  Esau,  at  least  for  the 
time,  in  peace,  and  return  to  the  main  stream  of  the 
history,  Jacob  and  his  latter  days. 

5.  He  too  moves  onward.  From  the  summit  of 
Mount  Gerizim  the  eye  rests  on  the  wide  opening  in 
the  eastern  hills  beyond  the  Jordan,  which  marks  the 
issue  of  the  Jabbok  into  the  Jordan  valley.  Through 
that  opening,  straight  towards  Gerizim  and  Shechem, 
J acob  descends  in  peace  ” 4  and  triumph. 

At  every  stage  of  his  progress  henceforward  we  are 
reminded  that  it  is  the  second,  and  not  the  settlement 
first  settlement  of  Palestine,  that  is  now  un- at  Sheohem* 

1  Job.  xxxix.  18;  xli.  34.  3  J0b  xxix.  11,  25. 

2  lb.  xlii.  16  (LXX.).  For  Jobab  4  Gen.  xxxiii.  18,  “to  Shalem ;  ” 
see  Gen.  jtxxvi.  33.  Comp,  also  Fa-  more  accurately,  “  in  peace.”  For 
bricius,  Cod.  pseudepigr.  796-798.  the  “  triumph  ”  see  xlviii.  22. 


76 


JACOB. 


Lect.  Ill 


folding  itself.  It  is  no  longer,  as  in  the  case  of 
Abraham,  the  purely  pastoral  life ;  it  is  the  gradual 
transition  from  the  pastoral  to  the  agricultural.  Jacob, 
on  his  first  descent  from  the  downs  of  Gilead,  is  no 
longer  a  mere  dweller  in  tents ;  he  “  builds  him  an 
“  house ;  ”  he  makes  “  booths  ”  or  “  huts  ”  for  his  cattle, 
and  therefore  the  name  of  the  place  is  called  “Succoth.” 
He  advances  across  the  Jordan ;  he  comes  to  Shechem 
in  the  heart  of  Palestine,  whither  Abraham  had  come 
before  him.  But  it  is  no  longer  the  uninhabited 
“  place  ”  and  grove ;  it  is  “  the  city  ”  of  Shechem,  and 
“  before  the  city  ”  his  tent  is  pitched.  And  he  comes 
not  merely  as  an  Arabian  wanderer,  but  as  with  a 
fixed  aim  and  fixed  habitation  in  view.  He  sets  his  eye 
on  the  rich  plain  which  stretches  eastward  of  the  city, 
now,  as  eighteen  centuries  ago,  and  then,  as  twenty 
centuries  yet  before,  “white  already  to  the  harvest”2 
with  its  waving  cornfields.  This,  and  not  a  mere 
sepulchre  like  the  cave  of  Machpelah,  is  the  possession 
which  he  purchases  from  the  inhabitants  of  the  land. 
The  very  pieces  of  money  with  which  he  buys  the 
land  are  not  merely  weighed,  as  in  the  bargain  with 
Ephron ;  they  are  stamped  with  the  earliest  mark  of 
coinage,  the  figures  of  the  lambs  of  the  flocks.3  In 
this  vale  of  Shechem  the  Patriarch  rests,  as  in  a  per¬ 
manent  home.  Beersheba,  Hebron,  even  Bethel,  are 
nothing  to  him  in  comparison  with  this  one  chosen 
portion,  which  is  to  descend  to  his  favorite  son.  Yet 
it  is  not  his  altogether  by  the  peaceful  occupation 
which  at  first  seems  implied.  Two  indications  remain 
to  us  of  a  more  warlike  character.  One  is  the  word 
of  the  aged  Patriarch  to  his  son  Joseph,  as  of  the 


1  Gen.  xxxiii.  17. 

2  John  iv.  35. 


3  Gen.  xxxiii.  19.  See  Cardinal 
Wiseman’s  Lectures ,  ii.  197. 


Lect.  III. 


THE  SETTLEMENT  AT  SHECHEM. 


77 


expiring  flash  of  the  spirit  of  an  ancient  conqueror : 
“Moreover  I  have  given  to  thee  one  portion  above 
“thy  brethren,  which  I  took  out  of  the  hand  of  the 
“Amorite  with  my  sword  and  with  my  how.”1  It 
may  allude  to  the  bloody  conquest  of  Shechem  by 
Simeon  and  Levi;  but  the  turn  of  expression  (“/have 
“  given  thee  ....  with  my  sword  and  my  bow  ”) 
rather  points  to  incidents  of  the  original  settlement, 
not  preserved  in  the  regular  narrative.  The  other  in¬ 
dication  is  omitted  altogether  in  the  Hebrew  record, 
but  remains  even  unto  this  day.  Outside  the  green 
vale  of  Shechem,  but  in  “  the  portion  of  the  field  east 
“  of  the  city,”  is  the  ancient  well,  which  can  hardly 
be  doubted  to  be  the  one  claimed  at  the  Christian 
era  by  the  Samaritans  as  “the  well  of  their  father 
“Jacob,  who  drank  thereof  himself,  and  his  children, 
“  and  his  cattle.”  2  A  natural  question  arises  at  the 
sight  of  this  well,  why  it  was  necessary  to  dig  it  at 
all,  when  so  close  at  hand  in  the  valley  which  falls 
into  this  plain  are  streams  of  living  water,  which  might 
have  been  thought  to  render  it  superfluous  ?  The 
answer  has  been  made3  with  all  appearance  of  proba¬ 
bility,  that  it  could  only  have  been  so  dug  by  one 
who  was  unwilling  to  trust  for  his  supply  of  water  to 
the  stronger  and  hostile  inhabitants  of  the  cultivated 
valley.  It  is,  if  so,  an  actually  existing  monument  of 
the  suspicious  attitude  of  the  old  Patriarch  towards 
his  neighbors,  and  of  his  habitual  prudence,  —  “  fearful 
“  lest,  he  being  few  in  number,  the  inhabitants  of  the 
“  land  sho.uld  gather  themselves  together  and  slay  him 
K  and  his  house.” 

1  Gen.  xlviii.  22. 

2  John  iv.  12.  See  Sinai  and  Palestine ,  ch.  v. 

3  Robinson,  B.  R.  ii.  286. 


78 


JACOB. 


Lect.  Ill 


Oak  of 
Deborah. 


6.  It  is  with  the  latest  portion  of  Jacob’s  life  that 
are  most  closely  interwoven  those  cords  of  natural 
and  domestic  affection  which  so  hind  his  name  round 
our  hearts.  He  revisits  then  his  old  haunts 
at  Bethel  and  Beersheba.  The  ancient  ser¬ 
vant  of  his  house,  Deborah,  his  mother’s  nurse,  the 
only  link  which  survived  between  him  and  the  face 
which  he  should  see  no  more,  dies,  and  is  not  forgob 
ten,  but  is  buried  beneath  the  hill  of  Bethel,  under 
the  oak  well  known  to  the  many  who  passed  that 
way  in  later  times  as  Allon-bachuth,  “The  Oak  of 
Tears.”  He  advances  yet  a  day’s  journey  southward. 
They  draw  near  to  a  place  then  known  only  by  its 
ancient  Canaanite  name,  and  now  for  the  first  time 
mentioned  in  history,  “  Ephratah,  which  is  Bethlehem.” 
The  village  appears  spread  along  its  narrow  ridge, 
but  they  are  not  to  reach  it.  “  There  was  but  a  little 
“  way  to  come  to  Ephrath,  and  Rachel  travailed,  and 
“  she  had  hard  labour.  .  .  .  And  it  came  to  pass,  as 
“her  soul  was  in  departing,  for  she  died,  that  she 
“  called  the  name  of  the  child  Ben-oni  (that  is,  ‘  the 
“  son  of  sorrow  ’) ;  but  his  father  called  him  Ben-jamin 
“(that  is,  ‘the  son  of  my  right  hand’).  And  Rachel 
“  died,  and  was  buried  in  the  way  to  Ephrath.  And 

The  grave  “  Jac°k  set  a  pillar  on  her  grave,  that  is  the 
of  Rachel.  « pillar  of  Rachel’s  grave  unto  this  day.” 1 

The  pillar  has  long  disappeared,  but  its  memory  has 
remained.  After  the  allotment  of  the  country  to  the 
several  tribes,  the  territory  of  the  Benjamites  was  ex¬ 
tended  by  a  long  strip  far  into  the  south  to  include 
the  sepulchre  of  their  beloved  ancestress.2  As  late 
as  the  Christian  era,  when  the  infants  of  Bethlehem3 
were  slaughtered  by  Herod,  it  seemed  to  the  Evan- 


1  Gen.  xxxv.  16-20. 


2  1  Sam.  x.  2. 


3  Matt.  ii.  18. 


Lect.  III. 


DEATH  OF  RACHEL. 


79 


gelist  as  though  the  voice  of  Rachel  were  heard 
weeping  for  her  children  from  her  neighboring  grave. 
On  the  spot  indicated  by  the  sacred  narrative,  a 
rude  cupola,  under  the  name  of  Rachel’s  tomb,  still 
attracts  the  reverence  of  Christians,  Jews,  and  Mus¬ 
sulmans. 

Beside  u  the  watch-tower  of  the  flocks,” 1  in  the  same 
region  where  centuries  afterwards  there  were  still 
“  shepherds  abiding  in  the  fields,  watching  over  their 
“  flocks  by  night,”  Israel  spread  his  desolate  tent ; 
and  onward  he  went  yet  again  to  Hebron,  66  to  bury 
“  his  father  in  the  cave  of  Machpelah,”  and  The  stay  at 
to  linger  awhile  at  the  spot  “  in  the  land Hebron* 
a  wherein  his  father  was  a  stranger.”  In  the  mixture 
of  agricultural  and  pastoral  life  which  now  gathers 
round  him  is  laid  the  train  of  the  last  and  most 
touching  incidents  of  Jacob’s  story.  It  is  whilst  they 
are  feeding  their  father’s  flocks  together,  that  the 
fatal  envy  arises  against  the  favorite  son.  It  is  whilst 
they  are  binding  the  sheaves  in  the  well-known  corn¬ 
field  that  Joseph’s  sheaf  stands  upright  in  his  dream. 
On  the  confines  of  the  same  field  at  Shechem  the 
brothers  were  feeding  their  flocks,  when  Joseph  was 
sent  from  Hebron  to  u  see  whether  it  was  well  with 
“  his  brethren,  and  well  with  the  flocks,  and  to  bring 
“  his  father  word  again.”  And  from  Shechem  he  fol¬ 
lowed  them  to  the  two  wells  of  Dothan,2  in  the 
passes  of  Manasseh,  when  the  caravan  of  Arabian 
merchants  passed  by  and  he  disappeared  from  his  fa¬ 
ther’s  eyes.  His  history  belongs  henceforth  to  a  wider 
sphere.  The  glimpse  of  Egypt,  opened  to  us  for  a 
moment  in  the  life  of  Abraham,  now  spreads  into  a 
vast  and  permanent  prospect. 

1  Edar.  Gen.  xxxv.  21 ;  Luke  ii.  8. 


2  Sinai  and  Palestine ,  247. 


80 


JACOB. 


Lect.  Ill 


7.  This  shall  he  reserved  for  the  consideration  of 
The  descent  the  general  relations  of  Israel  to  Egypt.  But 
into  Egypt,  the  story  itself,  though  too  familiar  to  be  re¬ 
peated  here,  too  simple  to  need  any  elaborate  eluci¬ 
dation,  is  a  fitting  close  to  the  life  of  Jacob.  Once 
more  he  is  to  set  forth  on  his  pilgrimage.  The 
old  wanderer,  the  Hebrew  Ulysses,  has  still  a  new 
call,  a  new  migration,  new  trials,  and  new  glory 
before  him.  The  feeling  so  beautifully  described 
by  the  modern  poet  is  there  first  shadowed  forth  in 
action : 


“  Something  ere  the  end, 

Some  work  of  noble  note  may  yet  be  done  .  .  .  . 
’Tis  not  too  late  to  seek  a  newer  world  .... 
Made  weak  by  time  and  fate,  but  strong  in  will 
To  strive,  to  seek,  to  find,  and  not  to  yield.” 


He  came  to  the  frontier  plain  of  Beersheba;  he  re¬ 
ceived  the  assurance  that  beyond  that  frontier  he  was 
to  descend  yet  further  into  Egypt.  “  God  spake  unto 
“  Israel  in  the  visions  of  the  night,  and  said,  Jacob, 
“  Jacob.  And  he  said,  Here  am  I.  And  He  said,  I  am 
“  God,  the  God  of  thy  father  ;  fear  not  to  go  down 
“into  Egypt,  for  I  will  there  make  of  thee  a  great 
“  nation.”  He  “  went  down  ”  from  the  steppes  of 
Beersheba;  he  crossed  the  desert  and  met  his  son 
on  the  border  of  the  cultivated  land ;  he  was  brought 
into  the  presence  of  the  great  Pharaoh;  he  saw  his 
race  established  in  the  land  of  Egypt.  And  then  the 
time  drew  near  that  Israel  must  die;  and  his  one 
thought,  oftentimes  repeated,  was  that  his  bones 
should  not  rest  in  that  strange  land;  not  in  pyramid 
or  painted  chamber,  but  in  the  cell  that  “he  had 
“  digged  for  himself,”  in  the  primitive  sepulchre  of  his 


* 


Lect.  III.  DESCENT  INTO  EGYPT.  81 

fathers.  "Bury  me  not,  I  pray  thee,  in  Egypt,  but  I 
"  will  lie  with  my  fathers,  and  thou  shalt  carry  me  out 
"  of  Egypt,  and  bury  me  in  their  burial-place.  .  .  .  Bury 
"me  with  my  fathers,  in  the  cave  that  is  in  the  field 
"  of  Ephron  the  Hittite,  in  the  cave  that  is  in  the 
"  field  of  Machpelah,  which  is  before  Mamre,  in  the 
"  land  of  Canaan,  which  Abraham  bought  with  the 
"field  of  Ephron  the  Hittite  for  a  possession  of  a 
"  burial-place.  There  they  buried  Abraham  and  Sarah 
"  his  wife ;  there  they  buried  Isaac  and  Bebekah  his 
"  wife ;  and  there  I  buried  Leah.  The  purchase  of 
"  the  field  and  of  the  cave  that  is  therein  was  from 
"  the  children  of  Heth.  And  when  Jacob  had  made 
"  an  end  of  commanding  his  sons,  he  gathered  The  death 
"  up  his  feet  into  the  bed  and  yielded  up  the  of  Jacob- 
"  ghost,  and  was  gathered  to  his  people.”  His  body 
was  embalmed  after  the  manner  of  the  Egyptians. 
A  vast  funeral  procession  bore  it  away ;  the  asses 
and  the  camels  of  the  pastoral  tribe  mingled  with 
the  chariots  and  horsemen  characteristic  of  Egypt. 
They  came  (so  the  narrative  seems  to  imply)  not  by 
the  direct  road  which  the  Patriarchs  had  hitherto 
traversed  on  their  way  to  Egypt  by  El-Arish,  but 
round  the  long  circuit  by  which  Moses  afterwards  led 
their  descendants,  till  they  arrived  on  the  banks  of 
the  Jordan.  Further  than  this  the  Egyptian  escort 
came  not.  But  the  valley  of  the  Jordan  resounded 
with  the  loud  shrill  lamentations  peculiar  to  their 
ceremonial  of  mourning ;  and  writh  the  funeral  games 
with  which,  then  as  now,  the  Arabs  encircle  the 
tomb  of  a  departed  chief.  From  this  double  tradition 
the  spot  was  known  in  after-times  as  "the  meadow,” 
or  "  the  mourning,”  "  of  the  Egyptians,”  Abel-Mizraim ; 

and  as  Beth-hogla ,  "the  house  of  the  circling  dance.” 

11 


82 


JACOB. 


Lect.  III. 


“And  liis  sons  carried  him  into  the  land  of  Canaan 
“  and  buried  him  in  the  cave  of  the  field  of  Machpe- 
“  lah.  .  .  .  And  Joseph  returned  into  Egypt,  he  and  all 
“his  brethren,  and  all  that  went  up  with  him,  .  .  . 
“  after  he  had  buried  his  father.” 


Lect.  IY. 


ISRAEL  IN  EGYPT. 


83 


LECTURE  IY. 

ISRAEL  IN  EGYPT. 

The  appearance  of  Joseph  in  Egypt  is  the  first  dis¬ 
tinct  point  of  contact  between  sacred  and  secular  his¬ 
tory,  and  it  is,  accordingly,  not  surprising  that  in  later 
times  this  part  of  his  story  should  have  become  the 
basis  of  innumerable  fancies  and  traditions  outside  the 
limits  of  the  Biblical  narrative.  His  arrival  in  Egypt, 
his  acquisition  of  magical  art,  his  beauty,  his  interpre¬ 
tation  of  dreams,  his  prediction  of  the  famine,  his  favor 
with  the  king,  are  told  briefly  but  accurately  in  the 
compilation  of  the  historian  Justin.1  The  feud  of  the 
modern  Samaritans  and  Jews  is  carried  up  by  them 
to  the  feud  between  Joseph  and  his  brethren.2  The 
history  of  Joseph  and  Asenath  is  to  this  day  one  of 
the  canonical  books  of  the  Church  of  Armenia.  To  the 
description  of  the  loves  of  Joseph  and  Zuleika  in  the 
Koran,  Mahomet  appealed  as  one  of  the  chief  proofs  of 
his  inspiration.  Christian  pilgrims  of  the  Middle  Ages 
took  for  granted  that  the  three  or  the  seven  pyramids 
which  they  saw  from  the  Nile  could  be  nothing  else 
than  Joseph’s  barns.3  The  well  of  Joseph  and  the  canal 
of  Joseph  are  still  shown  to  unsuspecting  travellers  by 
unsuspecting  guides,  from  a  wild  but  not  unnatural  con¬ 
fusion  of  his  career  with  that  of  his  great  Mussulman 

* 

1  Justin,  xxxvi.  2.  Comp,  also  2  Wolff,  Travels ,  &c.  ch.  vii. 

Artapanus,  in  Euseb.  Pr.  Ev.  ix.  23.  3  Maundeville,  in  Early  Trav.  154. 


84 


JOSEPH  IN  EGYPT. 


Lect.  IV. 


namesake,  the  Sultan  Yussuf,  or  Joseph,  Saladin  I.  But 
the  most  solid  links  of  connection  between  the  story  of 
Joseph  and  the  state  of  the  ancient  world  are  those 
which  are  supplied  by  the  simple  story  itself  on  the 
one  hand,  and  our  constantly  increasing  knowledge 
of  the  Egyptian  monuments  on  the  other  hand. 

I.  It  has  been  said  that  Egypt 1  must  have  presented 
Joseph  in  to  the  nomadic  tribes  of  Asia  the  same  con- 
Egypt'  trast  and  the  same  attractions  that  Italy  and 
the  southern  provinces  of  the  Roman  Empire  pre¬ 
sented  to  the  Gothic  and  Celtic  tribes  who  descended 
upon  them  from  beyond  the  Alps.  Such  is,  in  fact, 
the  impression  left  upon  our  minds  when  we  are  first 
introduced  into  the  full  view  of  Egypt,  as  we  follow 
in  the  track  of  the  caravan  of  Arabian  merchants  who 
carried  off  Joseph  from  the  wells  of  Dothan.  We  need 
only  touch  on  the  main  incidents  in  the  story  to  see 
that  it  is  the  chief  seat  of  power  and  civilization  then 
known  in  the  world,  and  that  it  is  the  same  as  that 
of  which  the  memorials  have  been  so  wonderfully  pre- 
Egypt.  served  to  our  own  time.  What  I  have  said  of 
the  retention  of  the  outward  appearance  of  the  Pa¬ 
triarchs  in  the  unchangeable  customs  of  the  Arabian 


tribes,  is  true,  in  another  sense,  of  the  retention  of 
the  outward  appearance  of  the  Pharaohs  in  the  un¬ 
changeable  monuments  of  Egypt.  The  extraordinary 
clearness  and  dryness  of  the  climate,  the  singular 
vicinity  of  the  desert  sands  which  have  preserved 
what  they  have  overwhelmed,  the  passionate  desire 
of  the  old  Egyptians  to  perpetuate  every  familiar  and 


1  The  Biblical  names  of  Egypt  are  —  the  one  in  the  Arabic  name  of  Cairo, 
Mizraim  (possibly  from  the  two  banks,  Misr:  the  other  in  the  word  “  al- 
or  the  upper  and  lower  districts),  and  chemy”  “  chemistry,”  as  derived  from 
Ham  (dark).  Traces  of  both  remain,  the  medical  fame  of  ancient  Egypt. 


Lect.  IV. 


JOSEPH  IN  EGYPT. 


85 


loved  object  as  long  as  human  power  and  skill  could 
reach,  have  all  contributed  to  this  result.  The  wars, 
the  amusements,  the  meals,  the  employments,  the 
portraits,  nay  even  the  very  bodies,  of  those  ancient 
fathers  of  the  civilized  world  are  still  amongst  us.  We 
can  form  a  clearer  image  of  the  court  of  the  Pha¬ 
raohs,  in  all  external  matters,  than  we  can  of  the 
court  of  Augustus.  And,  therefore,  at  each  successive 
disclosure  of  the  state  of  Egypt  in  the  Sacred  narrar 
tive,  we  find  ourselves  amongst  old  friends  and  familiar 
faces.  We  know  not  whether  we  may  not  have 
touched  a  human  hand  that  was  pressed  by  the  hand 
of  Jacob  or  Joseph.  We  are  sure,  as  we  gaze  on  the 
contemporary  pictures  of  regal  or  social  life,  that  we 
are  seeing  the  very  same  customs  and  employments 
in  which  they  partook. 

We  see  Pharaoh  surrounded  by  the  great  officers 
of  his  court,  each  at  the  head  of  his  department,  re¬ 
sponsible,  as  at  the  present  day,  for  the  conduct  of 
every  one  beneath  him;  the  prison,  the  bakery,  the 
vintage,  the  wise  men,  the  stewards,1  the  priests,  the 
high  priest.  The  Nile  presents  itself  to  us  for  the 
first  time  under  its  peculiar  Hebrew  name,2  which  in¬ 
dicates  its  strange  and  unique  significance  amongst  the 
rivers  of  the  earth.  The  papyrus,3  which  then  grew 
in  its  stream,  is  now  extinct;  but  the  green  slip  of 
land,  achu ,  —  “  meadow,”  as  it  is  translated,4  runs  along 
its  banks  now,  as  then.  Out  of  its  waters,  swimming 
across  its  stream,  come  up  the  buffaloes  or  the  sacred 


1  See  Mr.  Goodwin’s  Essay  ( Cam¬ 
bridge  Essays,  1858,  p.  248). 

2  “  lor”  and  “  Siclior”  ( Sinai  and 
Palestine,  Appendix,  §  36).  In  Egyp¬ 

tian  it  was  “  Hapi-Mu,”  the  genius 

(Apis)  of  the  waters  (mu').  The 


word  “Nile”  is  derived  from  an 
Egyptian  word  signifying  “  blue.” 
Wilkinson,  v.  57;  Sharpe,  145. 

3  Job  viii.  11 ;  Isa.  xviii.  2  ;  Ex.  ii.  3. 

4  Gen.  xli.  2  ;  Sinai  and  Palestine , 
App.  §  18. 


86 


JOSEPH  IN  EGYPT. 


Lect.  IY. 


kine,  as  in  Pharaoh’s  dream,  the  fit  symbols  of  the 
leanness  or  the  fertility  of  the  future  years.  The 
drought  which  withers  up  the  herbage  of  the  sur¬ 
rounding  countries,  brings  famine  on  Egypt  also.  The 
Nile1  (so  we  must  of  necessity  interpret  the  vision  of 
Pharaoh  and  its  fulfilment),  from  the  failure  of  the 
Abvssinian  rains,  fell  short  of  its  due  level.  Twice 
only,  in  the  eleventh  and  in  the  twelfth  centuries  of 
the  Christian  era,  such  a  catastrophe  is  described  by 
Arabian  historians  in  terms  which  give  us  a  full  con¬ 
ception  of  the  calamity  from  which  Joseph  delivered 
the  country.  The  first  lasted,  like  that  of  Joseph,  for 
seven  years :  of  the  other,  the  most  fearful  details  are 
given  by  an  eye-witness.  “  Then  the  year  presented 
“  itself  as  a  monster  whose  wrath  must  annihilate  all 
“  the  resources  of  life  and  all  the  means  of  subsist- 
“  ence.  The  famine  began  .  .  .  large  numbers  emi- 
“  grated.  .  .  .  The  poor  ate  carrion,  corpses,  and 
“  dogs.  .  .  .  They  went  further,  devouring  even  little 
“  children.  The  eating  of  human  flesh  became  so  com- 
“  mon  as  to  excite  no  surprise.  .  .  .  The  people  spoke 
“  and  heard  of  it  as  of  an  indifferent  thing.  ...  a  As 
“for  the  number  of  the  poor  who  perished  from  hun- 
“  ger  and  exhaustion,  God  alone  knows  what  it  was. 
“  .  .  .  A  traveller  often  passed  through  a  large  vil- 
“  lage  without  seeing  a  single  living  inhabitant.  .  .  . 
“  In  one  village  we  saw  the  dwellers  of  each  house 
“  extended  dead,  the  husband,  the  wrife,  and  the  chil- 
“  dren.  ...  In  another,  where  till  late  there  had 
“  been  four  hundred  weaving  shops,  we  saw  in  like 
“  manner  the  weaver  dead  in  his  corn-pit,  and  all  his 
“dead  family  round  him.  We  were  here  reminded  of 

1  It  is  explained  by  Osburn  (Monu-  of  a  great  inland  lake,  and  the  conse- 
mental  Egypt ,  ii.  1 35)  by  the  bursting  quent  reaction. 


Lect.  IV. 


JOSEPH  IN  EGYPT. 


87 


u  the  text  of  the  Koran,  6  One  single  cry  was  heard, 
“  and  they  all  perished.’  The  road  between  Egypt 
“  and  Syria  was  like  a  vast  field  sown  with  human 
“  bodies,  or  rather  like  a  plain  which  has  jnst  been 
“  swept  by  the  scythe  of  the  mower.  It  had  become 
“  as  a  banquet  hall  for  the  birds,  wild  beasts,  and 

“  dogs,  which  gorged  on  their  flesh.”  These  are  but 

a  few1  of  the  horrors  which  Abd-el-Latif  details,  and 
which  may  well  explain  to  us  how  “  the  land  of  Egypt 
“  fainted  by  reason  of  the  famine,”  —  how  the  cry  came 
up  year  by  year  to  Joseph:  “  Give  us  bread,  for  why 
“  should  we  die  in  thy  presence  ?  Wherefore  shall  we 
“  die  before  thine  eyes,  both  we  and  our  land  ?  Buy 
u  us  and  our  land  for  bread,  and  we  and  our  land  will 
“  be  ‘  slaves  ’  to  Pharaoh ;  and  give  us  seed  that  we 

“  may  live  and  not  die,  and  that  the  land  be  not 

“  desolate.  .  .  .  Thou  hast  saved  our  lives ;  let  us 
“  find  grace  in  the  sight  of  my  lord,  and  we  will  be 
“  Pharaoh’s  ‘  slaves.’  ”  What  were  the  per-  Joseph  as 

Pharaoh’s 

manent  results  of  the  legislation  ascribed  to  viceroy. 
Joseph,  and  what  its  relations  to  the  regulations 
ascribed  to  others  in  Gentile  historians,  are  questions 
which  belong  to  the  still  obscure  region  of  Egyptian 
history.  But  there  is  no  difficulty  in  conceiving  from 
what  is  to  be  seen  in  the  past  and  the  present  state 
of  Egypt  the  causes  and  the  nature  of  Joseph’s  great¬ 
ness  ;  how  the  Hebrew  slave,  through  the  rapid  transi¬ 
tions  of  Oriental  life,  became  the  ruler  of  the  land ;  in 
language,  dress,  and  appearance  a  member  of  the  great 
Egyptian  aristocracy,  “  binding  their  princes  at  his 

1  The  whole  narrative  is  given  by  Travel ,  ch.  20.  The  earlier  famine 
Abd-el-Latif  ( Relation  de  VEgypte,  ii.  (a.  d.  1064-1071)  is  described  by  El- 
ch.  2,  a.  d.  1200).  Large  extracts  are  Macrizi  (see  Dr.  Smith’s  Dictionary 
given  in  Miss  Martineau’s  Eastern  of  the  Bible,  “  Famine”). 


88 


JOSEPH  IN  EGYPT. 


Lect.  IY. 


“pleasure,  and  teaching  their  senators  wisdom.”  He 
is  invested  with  the  golden  chain  or  necklace  as  with 
an  order,  exactly  according  to  the  investiture  of  the 
royal  officers,  as  represented  in  the  Theban  sculptures.1 
He  is  clothed  in  the  white  robe  of  sacred  state,  that 
appears  in  such  marked  contrast  on  the  tawny  figures 
of  the  ancient  priests.  He  bears  the  royal  ring,  such 
as  are  still  found  in  the  earliest  sepulchres.  He  rides^ 
in  the  royal  chariot  that  is  seen  so  often  rolling  its 
solemn  way  in  the  monumental  processions.  Before 
him  goes  the  cry  of  some  Egyptian  shout  ( Abrech  /),2 
evidently  resembling  those  which  now  in  the  streets 
of  Cairo  clear  the  way  for  any  great  personage  driv 
ing3  through  the  crowded  masses  of  man  and  beast. 
His  Hebrew  name  of  Joseph  disappears  in  the  sound¬ 
ing  Egyptian  title,  whichever  version  of  it  we  adopt, 
—  Zapnath  Paaneach,  “  Revealer  of  secrets,”  or  Pson- 
thom  Phanech,4  “Saviour  of  the  age.”  He  becomes 
the  son-in-law  of  the  High  Priest  of  the  Sun-God  in 
the  sacred  city  of  On.  He  and  his  wife  Asenath,  the 
servant  of  the  goddess  Neith  (the  Egyptian  Athene 
or  Minerva),  may  henceforth  be  conceived,  as  in  the 
many  connubial  monuments  of  the  priestly  order,  each 
with  their  arms  intertwined  round  the  other’s  neck, 
each  looking  out  from  the  other’s  embrace  with  the 
peculiar  placid  look  which  makes  these  old  Egyptian 
tablets  the  earliest  type  of  the  solemn  happiness  and 
calm  of  a  stately  marriage.  The  multiplication  of  his 
progeny  is  compared,  not  to  the  stars  of  the  Chal- 
dsean  heavens,  or  to  the  sand  of  the  Syrian  shore,  but 

1  See  Wilkinson,  plate  80.  *  This  is  the  form  given  to  the 

2  Gen.  xli.  43.  name  in  the  Septuagint.  See  Kno- 

3  Compare  1  Sam.  viii.  11 ;  2  Sam.  bel’s  Genesis ,  284. 

xv.  1 ;  1  Kings  i.  5. 


Lect.  IV. 


ISRAEL  IN  EGYPT 


89 


to  the  countless  fish  swarming  in  the  great  Egyptian 
river.1  Not  till  his  death,  and  hardly  even  then,  does 
he  return  to  the  customs  of  his  fathers.  He  is  em¬ 
balmed  with  Egyptian  skill,  and  laid  in  the  usual 
Egyptian  case  or  coffin.  He  rests  not  in  any  Egyp¬ 
tian  tomb,  but  yet  not,  even  as  his  father,  in  the  an¬ 
cestral  cave  of  Machpelah.  An  Israelite  at  heart  but 
an  Egyptian  in  outward  form,  “  separate  from  his 
“  brethren  ”  by  the  singular  Providence  that  had  chosen 
him  for  a  special  purpose,  he  was  to  lie  apart  from 
the  great  Patriarchal  family  in  the  fairest  spot  in  Pal¬ 
estine  marked  out  specially  for  himself.  In  the  rich 
cornfield,  hard  by  his  father’s  well,  centuries  after¬ 
wards,  “  the  bones  of  Joseph,  which  the  children  of 
“  Israel  brought  up  out  of  Egypt,  buried  they  in 
“  Shechem,  in  the  parcel  of  ground  which  J acob 
“  bought  of  the  sons  of  Hamor  the  father  of  Shechem 
“  for  a  hundred  pieces  of  silver.”  The  whole  region 
round  became  by  this  consecration  “  the  inheritance 
“  of  the  sons  of  Joseph.” 2  And  if  the  name  of  Joseph 
never  reached  the  same  commanding  eminence  as 
that  of  Abraham  or  Jacob,  it  was  yet  a  frequent  des¬ 
ignation  of  the  whole  people,  and  a  constant  desig¬ 
nation  of  the  larger  portion.3 

II.  Thus  ended  the  career  of  the  Hebrew  viceroy 
of  the  Pharaohs.  And  so  “  Israel  abode  in  stay  of 
“  Egypt,  and  Jacob  was  a  stranger  in  the  land  Egypt. 
a  of  Ham.”  In  this  transplantation  of  the  Chosen 
People,  the  vine  was  to  strike  its  first  roots.  From 
the  same  valley  of  the  Nile,  whence  flowed  the  culture 
of  Greece,  was  to  flow  also  the  religion  of  Palestine 

l  Gen.  xlviii.  20  Heb.  (with  Mr.  2  Joshua,  xxiv.  32. 

Grove’s  comments  in  Dictionary  of  3  Ps.  lxxvii.  15;  lxxviii.  67;  lxxx 
Jie  Bible ,  “  Manasseh  ”).  1 ;  lxxxi.  5. 

12 


90 


ISRAEL  IN  EGYPT. 


Lect.  IY 


ft 


ft 


That  same  land  of  ancient  learning,  which  in  the 
schools  of  Alexandria  was,  ages  afterwards,  the  first 
settled  home  and  shelter  of  the  wandering  Christian 
Church,  was  also  the  first  settled  home  and  shelter 
of  the  wandering  Jewish  nation.  Egypt  was  the 
meeting  point,  geographically  and  historically,  of  the 
three  continents  of  the  ancient  world.  It  could  not 
but  bear  its  part  in  the  nurture  of  that  people  which 
was  itself  to  influence  and  guide  them  all. 

In  considering  the  stay  of  Israel  in  Egypt,  two  com¬ 
plicated  questions  arise.  The  first  refers  to  the  rela¬ 
tion  of  Israel  to  the  dynasty  of  the  Hyksos,  or  Shepherd 
Kings,  of  whom  we  read  in  Manetho.1  Were  they  the 
same  ?  or,  if  different,  did  the  Shepherd  Kings  precede, 
or  accompany,  or  succeed  the  settlement  of  the  Israel¬ 
ites  ?  The  second  question,  partly  dependent  on  the 
first,  refers  to  the  length  of  the  period  of  the  Israelite 
settlement.  Was  it  two  hundred  and  fifteen  years2 
(according  to  the  Septuagint),  or  four  hundred  and 
thirty  years  (according  to  the  Hebrew),  or  a  thousand 
years  according  to  the  modern  computations  of  Egyp¬ 
tian  chronology  ?  We  need  not  enter  on  any  detailed 
answer.  Not  only  are  the  present  materials  too 
conflicting  and  too  scanty  to  justify  any  certain  con¬ 
clusion,  but  there  is,  we  may  trust,  a  reasonable  pros¬ 
pect  that  any  conclusion  now  formed  may  be  modi¬ 
fied  or  reversed  by  fresh  discoveries  in  Egyptian 
investigations.  Two  facts,  however,  emerge  out  of  the 


1  Joseph,  c.  Apion ,  i.  26. 

2  For  the  215  years:  (1)  LXX.  and 
Samaritan  text  of  Ex.xii.  40  ;  (2)  Jos. 
Ant.  ii.  15,  §  2 ;  viii.  3,  §  1  ;  (3)  The 
division  implied  in  Gal.  iii.  1 7 ;  (4) 
nepiTTy  yevea,  Ex.  xiii.  18,  LXX. ;  (5) 
Genealogy  of  Moses,  Ex.  vi.  16-20. 


For  the  430  years:  (1)  Hebrew 
of  Ex.  xii.  40;  (2)  Gen.  xv.  13-16; 
(3)  Acts  vii.  6 ;  (4)  Jos.  B.  J.  ii.  9, 
1 ;  v.  9,  4 ;  (5)  600,000  fighting  men ; 
(6)  Genealogy  of  Joshua,  1  Chron. 
vii.  27. 


Lect.  IY. 


ISRAEL  IN  EGYPT. 


91 


t 


obscurity,  essential  to  the  understanding  of  the  future 
history. 

1.  First,  whatever  may  he  the  true  version  of  the  in¬ 
vasion  of  the  Shepherd  Kings,  the  migration  The 
of  the  Israelites  into  Egypt  was  undoubtedly  Kings, eInd 
that  of  a  pastoral  people,  distinct  in  manners,  J“te  of 
customs,  and  origin  from  the  nation  with  whom  IsraeL  4 
they  sojourned.  “  The  shepherds,”  even  then,  a  were 
“  an  abomination  to  the  Egyptians,”  and  when  Herod¬ 
otus  was  told  that  the  Pyramids  were  built  by  the 
shepherd  Philition,1  who  used  to  feed  his  flocks  at 
their  base,  it  was  an  echo  of  the  long-protracted 
hatred  which  the  Egyptians  still  cherished  against  the 
memory  of  the  pastoral  tribe  of  Palestine.  “  Thy 
“  servants  are  shepherds,  thy  servants’  trade  hath  been 
“  about  cattle  from  our  youth,  even  until  now ;  both 
a  we  and  also  our  fathers  ;  they  have  brought  their 
“  flocks  and  herds,  and  all  that  they  have.”2  They 
were  a  Bedouin  tribe  still,  as  truly  as  the  Arab  tribes 
who  now  tend  their  camels  underneath  the  Pyramids. 
The  only  incidents  of  their  history  during  this  period 
belong  to  this  pastoral  state,  —  the  incursion  of  the 
inhabitants  of  Gath  to  drive  away  the  cattle  of  the 
Ephraimites,  and  the  revenge  of  the  Ephraimites.3  The 
land  of  Goshen  was  the  frontier  land,  reckoned  as  in 
Arabia  rather  than  in  Egypt;  on  the  confines  of  the 
green  valley,  yet  on  the  verge  of  the  yellow  desert, 
they  fed  their  flocks,  they  watched  the  royal  herds. 
In  one  of  the  most  ancient  of  all  the  tombs  of  Egypt, 
that  called  from  the  wild  Arab  tribe  which  once  dwelt 
in  it,  Beni  Hassan,  —  the  children  of  Hassan, —  is 
depicted  a  procession  which  used  once  to  be  called 

1  Herod,  ii.  127.  3  i  Chron.  vii.  21-23  ;  viii.  13. 

2  Gen.  xlvi.  32,  34 ;  xlvii.  3. 


92 


ISRAEL  IN  EGYPT. 


Lect.  IV. 


the  presentation  of  Joseph’s  brethren.  This  it  cer¬ 
tainly  is  not.  There  is  no  person  in  the  picture  cor¬ 
responding  either  to  Joseph  or  Pharaoh.  Nor  is  there 
any  exactness  of  likeness  either  in  the  numbers  of  the 
persons  represented,  or  of  the  produce  which  they 
bring.  But,  though  not  hearing  any  direct  reference 
to  this  special  event,  it  is  yet  an  instructive  illustration 
of  the  general  relation  of  the  Israelites  to  Egypt. 
The  dresses,  physiognomy,  and  beards  of  the  procession 
point  them  out  to  be  foreigners  ; 1  whilst  their  atti¬ 
tude  and  appearance  equally  show  that  they  are  not 
captives.  The  produce  they  bring  is  evidently  from 
the  desert,  long  herds  of  ostriches.  The  character 
which  pervades  the  whole — children  carried  in  pan¬ 
niers  on  the  backs  of  asses2 — exactly  agrees  with  the 
Patriarchal  nature  of  the  first  Israelite  settlement. 

2.  If  this,  and  like  indications,  illustrate  the  earlier 
Theservi-  portion  of  the  stay  in  Egypt,  the  ancient  repre- 
israei.  sentations  and  the  modern  customs,  which  seem 
to  have  retained  through  all  the  changes  of  govern¬ 
ment  a  peculiar  character  of  their  own,  illustrate  the 
second  portion.  When  the  “  new  king  arose  that 
“  knew  not  Joseph,”  whether  from  change  of  dynasty 
or  character,  they  sank  lower  still ;  they  became,  like 
so  many  ancient  tribes  in  older  times,  the  public  serfs 
or  slaves  of  the  ruling  race.  Like  the  Pelasgians  in 
Attica,  like  the  Gibeonites  afterwards  in  their  own 
Palestine,  they  were  employed,  if  not  in  those  gigantic 
works  which  still  speak  of  the  sacrifice  and  toil  of  the 
multitudes  by  whom  they  were  erected,  yet  in  making 
bricks  for  treasure  cities  and  fastnesses,  as  may  be 
seen  in  the  representations  of  the  Theban  tombs,  where 
Asiatics  at  least,  if  not  Jews,  are  shown  working  by 

1  SeeBrugsch,  Hist,  de  VEgypte ,  i.  62.  2  See  below,  p.  104. 


Lect.  IV. 


SERVITUDE  OF  ISRAEL. 


93 


hundreds  at  this  very  occupation.  Not  only  was  there 
the  well-known  brick  pyramid,  probably  long  anterior 
to  the  Israelite  migration,  but  all  the  outer  enclosures 
of  cities,  temples,  and  tombs,  were  high  walls1  of  crude 
brick.  And  they  were  also  drawn  away  from  their 
free  trade  of  shepherds  to  the  hard  labor  of  “  service 
in  the  field,”2  such  as  we  still  see  along  the  banks  of 
the  Nile,  where  the  peasants,  naked  under  the  burning 
sun,  work  through  the  day,  like  pieces  of  machinery, 
in  drawing  up  the  buckets  of  water  from  the  level  of 
the  river  for  the  irrigation  of  the  fields  above.3  The 
cruel  punishment  which  is  described  as  aggravating 
their  bondage,  as  when  Moses  saw  the  Egyptian  strik¬ 
ing  the  Israelite,  and  as  when  the  Israelite  officers  set 
over  their  countrymen  were  themselves  beaten  for 
their  countrymen’s  shortcomings,  is  the  exact  likeness 
of  the  bastinado,  which  appears  equally  on  the  ancient 
monuments  and  in  the  modern  villages  of  Egypt.  The 
complaint  of  the  Israelites  against  their  own  officers  is 
the  same  feeling  which  in  popular  songs  is  heard  from 
modern  Egyptian  peasants,  for  the  same  reason,  against 
the  chiefs  of  their  own  village  :  “  The  chief  of  the  vil- 
“  lage,  the  chief  of  the  village,  may  the  dogs  tear  him, 
“  tear  him,  tear  him !  ”  It  is  said  that  in  the  gangs 
of  boys  and  girls  set  to  work  along  the  Nile  is  to  be 
heard  the  strophe  and  antistrophe  of  a  melancholy  cho¬ 
rus  :  “  They  starve  us,  they  starve  us,”  —  “  They  beat 
“us,  they  beat  us;”  to  which  both  alike  reply,  “But 
“  there’s  some  one  above,  there’s  some  one  above,  who 
“  will  punish  them  well,  who  will  punish  them  well.” 4 

1  See  the  engraving  in  Brugsch,  9  Deut.  xi.  10. 

206,  174,  176.  4  MS.  Journal  of  a  Stay  in  Egypt , 

3  See  Lane’s  Modern  Egyptians ,  by  Mr.  Nassau  Senior :  1856. 

ch.  14,  the  Shadoof. 


94 


ISRAEL  IN  EGYPT. 


Lect.  IY. 


This,  with  but  very  slight  changes,  must  have  been 
the  cry  which  went  up  from  the  afflicted  Israelites 
“  by  reason  of  their  taskmasters.” 

III.  Whatever  may  have  been  the  precise  length  of 
Effects  of  their  sojourn  or  their  bondage,  it  was  at  any 
in  Egypt.  rate  long  enough  to  have  rendered  Egypt 
thoroughly  familiar  to  them.  They  seem  indeed  to 
have  left  but  slight  traces  of  themselves  on  Egypt  or 
its  monuments.  Memphis,  which  would  have  been  most 
likely  to  retain  indications  of  their  visit  and  of  their 
Exodus,  has  been  buried  or  swept  away ;  and  no  di¬ 
rect  mention  of  the  Jews  occurs  in  any  Egyptian  sculp¬ 
ture  or  picture,  till  the  representation  of  the  conquest 
of  Judah  by  Shishak,  many  centuries  later.  But  on 
the  Israelites,  whether  by  way  of  contrast  or  illustra¬ 
tion,  the  Egyptian  worship  and  manners  left  an  im¬ 
pression  almost  as  distinct  and  as  durable  as  that  which 
the  Roman  Empire,  under  analogous  circumstances  in 
long  subsequent  ages,  implanted  on  the  customs  and 
feelings  of  the  early  Christian  Church. 

1.  Take  first  the  scene  with  which  they  were  most 
Heliopolis,  likely  to  come  into  contact.  We  know  not 
with  certainty  the  chief  city  of  the  Egyptian  empire 
at  the  time  of  the  entrance  or  of  the  flight  of  the 
Israelites.  Memphis  was  probably  the  capital,  at  least 
of  Lower  Egypt,  and  the  constant  mention  of  the 
river  implies  that  Pharaoh  was  then  living  on  its 
banks.  Zoan,  or  Tanis,  is  the  only  town1  directly 
mentioned  in  connection  with  this  early  age.  Its  sit¬ 
uation  in  the  Delta  would  correspond  with  the  neigh¬ 
borhood  of  Goshen ;  and  as  it  was  undoubtedly  at  one 
period  of  Egyptian  history  the  seat  of  a  roj^al  dynasty, 
so  it  may  have  been  at  the  time  of  the  Exodus. 

1  Num.  xiii.  22 ;  Psalm  lxxviii.  12. 


Lect.  IV. 


EFFECTS  OF  THEIR  STAY. 


95 


There  is,  however,  another  city,  not  the  residence  of 
the  court,  but  which  is  constantly  brought  before  us 
in  connection  with  the  whole  history  of  Israel,  which 
still  in  part  remains,  and  which,  with  the  illustrations 
that  it  receives  from  the  other  Egyptian  monuments, 
may  well  serve  as  a  framework  to  our  whole  concep¬ 
tion  of  Egypt  as  it  appeared  to  the  Israelites.  On,1 
Heliopolis,  the  city  of  the  Sun,  was  the  spot  in  which 
heathen  tradition  fixed  the  residence  of  Abraham ; 
and,  with  more  certainty,  the  education  —  according 
to  one  version  the  birth  —  of  Moses.  It  was  undoubt¬ 
edly  the  dwelling-place  of  Joseph’s  bride.  It  was  near 
the  land  of  Goshen.  It  was  close  by  the  later  colony 
of  Leontopolis  set  up  by  the  second  settlement  of 
Israel  in  Egypt,  after  the  Babylonian  captivity.  It 
contains  the  sacred  fig-tree  shown  to  pilgrims  for  many 
centuries  as  that  under  which  the  Holy  Family  rested 
when,  for  the  last  time,  the  ancient  prophecy  was 
fulfilled,  “  Out  of  Egypt  have  I  called  my  Son.”  It  is 
thus  connected  with  every  stage  of  the  Sacred  history; 
but  its  special  concern  is  with  the  period  preceding 
the  Exodus.  Even  if  it  was  not  actually  the  school 
of  Moses,  it  must  have  been  constantly  within  his 
sight  and  that  of  his  countrymen,  as  they  passed  to 
and  fro  between  their  pastures  and  the  Nile. 

It  stands  on  the  edge  of  the  cultivated  ground. 
The  vast  enclosure  of  its  brick  walls  still  remains, 
now  almost  powdered  into  dust ;  but,  according  to  the 
tradition  of  the  Septuagint,  the  very  walls  built  by 
the  Israelite  bondmen.  Within  this  enclosure,  in  the 
space  now  occupied  by  tangled  gardens,  rose  the  great 
Temple  of  the  Sun,2  which  gave  its  name  and  object 

1  See  Brugsch,  254.  (LXX.  Ovv )  it  is  called  Bethsliemesh 

2  On  =  Light.  In  Jer.  xliii.  13  (the  house  of  the  sun),  as  it  was  and 


96 


ISRAEL  IN  EGYPT. 


Lect.  IV. 


to  the  city.  How  important  in  Egypt  was  that  wor¬ 
ship,  may  he  best  understood  by  remembering  that 
from  it  were  derived  the  chief  names  by  which  Kings 
and  Priests  were  called  —  “  Pha-raoh,”  “  The  Child  of 
the  Sun :  ”  “  Potiphe-rah,”  “  The  Servant  of  the  Sun.” 
And  what  its  aspect  was  in  Heliopolis  may  be  known 
partly  from  the  detailed  description  which  Strabo  has 
left  of  its  buildings,  as  still  standing  in  his  own  time ; 
and  yet  more  from  the  fact  that  the  one  Egyptian 
temple  which  to  this  day  retains  its  sculptures  and 
internal  arrangements  almost  unaltered,  that  of  Ipsam- 
bul,  is  the  temple  of  Ra,  or  the  Sun.  In  Heliopolis, 
as  elsewhere,  was  the  avenue  of  sphinxes  leading  to 
the  huge  gateway,  whence  flew,  from  gigantic  flag- 
staffs,  the  red  and  blue  streamers.  Before  and  behind 
the  gateway  stood,  two  by  two,  the  colossal  petrifac¬ 
tions  of  the  sunbeam,  the  obelisks,1  of  which  one  alone 
now  remains  to  mourn  the  loss  of  all  its  brethren. 
Close  by  was  the  sacred  spring2  of  the  Sun,  a  rare 
sight  in  Egypt,  and  therefore  the  more  precious,  and 
probably  the  original  cause  of  the  selection  of  this 
remote  corner  of  Egypt  for  so  famous  a  sanctuary. 
This  too  still  remains,  almost  choked  by  the  rank  lux¬ 
uriance  of  the  aquatic  plants  which  have  gathered 
over  its  waters.  Bound  the  cloisters  of  the  vast  courts 
into  which  these  gateways  opened  were  spacious  man¬ 
sions,  forming  the  canonical  residences,  if  one  may  so 

is  still  called  Ain-shems  (the  spring  of  =  “  finger  of  the  sun.”  With  one 
the  sun).  In  Amos  i.  5,  and  Ezek.  exception,  in  Fayum,  it  only  occurs 
xxx.  17,  it  is  called  “Aven”  (vanity),  on  the  eastern  bank.  Bunsen,  i.  371  ; 
as  a  play  on  the  word  On.  Wilkinson,  iv.  294. 

1  The  “  obelisk  ”  (which  is  merely  2  It  is  represented  in  the  Praenes- 
the  Greek  name  of  “  spit,”  applied  in  tine  Mosaic.  It  appears  in  Breyden- 
a  disparaging  spirit  to  the  great  works  bach’s  plan,  and  in  the  Apocryphal 
of  Egypt)  is  said  to  be  uben-ra ,  or  Gospels,  as  the  Spring  of  the  Virgin. 
uben-la  =  “  sunbeam,”  or  petobphra  See  Clarke,  v.  142. 


Lect.  IV. 


HELIOPOLIS. 


97 


call  them,  of  the  priests  and  professors  of  On :  for 
Heliopolis,  we  must  remember,  was  the  Oxford  of  an¬ 
cient  Egypt,  the  seat  of  its  learning  in  early  times,  as 
Alexandria  was  in  later  times ;  the  university,  or  rather 
perhaps  the  college,  gathered  round  the  Temple  of  the 
Sun,  as  Christ  Church  round  the  old  cathedral  or 
shrine  of  S.  Frideswide.  Thither  Herodotus  came  to 
gather  information  for  his  travels ;  and  thither,  cen¬ 
turies  later,  the  more  careful  and  accurate  Strabo.1 
The  city  in  his  time  was  in  a  state  of  comparative 
desolation ;  it  had  never  fully  recovered  the  shock 
of  the  fanatical  devastation  of  Cambyses.  A  long 
vacancy,  a  vacation  of  centuries,  had  passed  over  it. 
Priests  and  philosophers,  canons  and  professors,  alike 
were  gone,  and  only  a  few  chaplains  and  vergers2 
lingered  in  the  sacred  precincts,  to  carry  on  the  ser¬ 
vice  of  the  temple  and  to  show  strangers  over  the 
silent  quadrangles  and  deserted  cloisters.  Amongst 
these  was  pointed  out  to  Strabo  the  house  in  which 
Plato  had  lived  for  thirteen  years.  Perhaps  he  may 
have  been  also  shown,  or,  had  he  been  there  a  few 
generations  earlier,  would  have  been  shown,  the  house 
which  had  received  Moses  when  he  studied  there 
under  the  Egyptian  name  of  Osarsiph.3  In  the  cen¬ 
tre  of  all  stood  the  Temple  itself.  Over  the  portal, 
we  can  hardly  doubt,  was  the  figure  of  the  Sun-god; 
not  in  the  sublime  indistinctness  of  his  natural  orb, 
nor  yet  in  the  beautiful  impersonation  of  the  Grecian 
Apollo,  but  in  the  strange  grotesque  form  of  the  Hawk¬ 
headed  monster.  Enter;  and  the  dark  Temple  opens 
and  contracts  successively  into  its  outermost,  its  inner, 
and  its  innermost  hall;  the  Osiride  figures  in  their 

1  xvii.  1.  3  Jos.  c.  Apion ,  i.  26,  28. 

2  leponoioi  ical  kt-rjyTjTai. 

13 


98 


ISRAEL  IN  EGYPT. 


Lect.  IY. 


placid  majesty  support  the  first,  the  wild  and  savage 
exploits  of  kings  and  heroes  fill  the  second;  and  in  the 
furthest  recess  of  all,  underneath  the  carved  figure  of 
the  Sun-god,  and  beside  the  solid  altar,  sat  in  his 
gilded  cage  the  sacred  hawk,1  or  lay  crouched  on  his 
purple  bed  the  sacred  black  calf,2  Mnevis,  or  Urmer; 
each  the  living,  almost  incarnate,  representation  of  the 
deity  of  the  Temple.  Thrice  a  day  before  the  deified 
beast  the  incense  was  offered,  and  once  a  month  the 
solemn  sacrifice.3  Each  on  his  death  was  duly  em¬ 
balmed  and  deposited  in  a  splendid  sarcophagus.  One 
such  mummy  calf  is  still  to  be  seen  at  Cairo.  He 
was  the  great  rival  of  the  bull  Apis  at  Memphis ;  and 
Hadrian,  when  in  Egypt,  had  to  determine  a  contro¬ 
versy  respecting  their  precedence.4  The  sepulchres 
of  the  long  succession  of  deified  calves  at  Heliopolis 
corresponded  to  those  of  the  deified  bulls  at  Mem¬ 
phis.5  It  was  after  seeing  such  a  strange  and  mon¬ 
strous  climax  to  so  much  power  and  splendor  and 
wisdom,  that  the  Israelites  were  likely  both  to  need 
and  to  feel  the  force  of  the  warning  voice  :  “  Thou 
“  shalt  not  make  any  likeness  of  anything  that  is  in 
“  the  heaven  above  or  in  the  earth  beneath ;  .  .  .  the 
“  likeness  of  any  beast  that  is  on  the  earth,  the  like- 
“  ness  of  any  winged  fowl  that  flieth  in  the  air.” 6 
The  molten  calf  in  the  wilderness,  the  golden  calves 
of  Dan  and  Bethel,  were  reminiscences,  not  to  be 
wiped  out  of  the  national  memory  for  centuries,  of 
the  consecrated  calf  of  Ba,  the  god  Mnevis. 

2.  There  w^as  yet  another  form  of  idolatry,  never 

1  Wilk.  v.  207.  For  its  mode  of  were  shown  the  sacred  lions,  which 
maintenance,  see  Diod.  Sic.  i.  83.  gave  its  name  to  the  adjacent  city  of 

2  Brugsch,  257.  Leontopolis.  Wilk.  iv.  290,  v.  173. 

3  Wilk.  v.  315.  5  Brugsch,  259. 

4  In  another  part  of  the  precincts  6  Deut.  iv.  16,  17;  v.  8. 


Lect.  IV. 


EFFECTS  OF  THEIR  STAY. 


99 


out  of  sight  in  Egypt,  and  brought  out  with  immense 
force  in  the  whole  Mosaic  description.  What  Idolatry  of 
were  the  dynasties  that  ruled  at  that  time  over  kings' 
the  valley  of  the  Nile,  one  or  many,  we  need  not 
determine.  But  the  name  of  “Pharaoh”  clearly  ex¬ 
presses  that  the  same  virtue  of  regal  consecration  ran 
through  them  all;  and  the  name  of  “Rameses,”  as 
applied  to  one  of  the  treasure  cities1  built  by  the 
Israelites,  implies,  with  very  great  probability,  that 
this  name  had  already  become  famous  amongst  the 
Egyptian  kings.  The  statue,  found  near  the  ruins 
of  what  is  almost  certainly  the  site  of  Rameses,  points 
without  doubt  to  the  second  of  that  name.  What  then 
were  the  Pharaohs  collectively  in  the  eyes  of  the  na¬ 
tion  ?  and  what  was  Rameses  in  particular  ?  and  what, 
above  all,  was  Rameses  II.?  We  often  hear  it  said 
that  Egypt  was  governed  by  a  theocracy;  that  is,  as 
the  word  is  meant  when  so  applied,  by  a  priestly 
caste.  This  is  not  the  answer  given  by  her  own  au¬ 
thentic  monuments.  Who  is  the  colossal  figure  that  sits, 
repeated  again  and  again,  at  the  entrance  of  every 
temple  ?  Who  is  it  that  rides  in  his  chariot,  leading 
diminutive  nations  captive  behind  him  ?  To  whom  is 
it,  that,  in  the  frontispiece  of  every  gateway,  the  gods 
give  the  falchion  of  destruction,  with  the  command 
to  “  Slay,  and  slay,  and  slay  ”  ?  Whose  sculptured  im¬ 
age,  in  the  interior  of  the  Temple,  is  it  that  we  see 
brought  into  the  most  familiar  relations  with  the  highest 
powers,  equal  in  form  and  majesty,  suckled  by  the 
greatest  goddess,  fondled  by  the  greatest  god,  sitting 
beside  them,  arm  entwined  within  arm,  in  the  recesses 

1  The  treasure  cities  are :  (1)  R,a-  Sarou,  the  fortress  of  the  Tyrians 
ineses  =  Heroopolis  (Abukeshib).  (i.  e.  probably  from  the  Israelites). 
(2)  Pithom  (in  Egyptian  Pachtoum-  Brugsch,  i.  156.  (3)  On,  LXX. 


100 


ISRAEL  IN  EGYPT. 


Lect.  IV. 


of  the  most  holy  place?  It  is  no  priest,  or  prophet, 
or  magician,  or  saint,  but  the  King  only  —  the  Pha¬ 
raoh,  the  Child  of  the  Sun,  the  Beloved  of  Ammon. 
Rameses  ii.  And,  if  there  is  one  king  who  towers  above 
all  the  rest  in  all  the  long  succession,  it  is  he  whose 
name  first  dimly  appears  to  us  in  the  history  of 
the  Exodus,  the  great  Rameses,1  the  Sesostris  of 
the  classical  writers.  As  of  all  objects  of  idolatry 
in  the  natural  world  of  those  early  times,  the  stars 
and  sun  were  the  most  overwhelming  in  their  fas¬ 
cination,  so  in  all  the  world  of  man,  there  was  noth¬ 
ing  to  be  compared  to  those  mighty  kings,  least 
of  all  to  the  mighty  conqueror  who  has  left  his  traces 
throughout  all  the  haunts  of  ancient 2  civilization 
in  Asia,  and  from  end  to  end  of  his  own  country. 
With  a  certainty  beyond  that  with  which  Alexander 
was  acknowledged  as  the  greatest  sovereign  of  the 
Grecian,  or  Caesar  of  the  Roman  world,  must  Rameses 
II.  have  been  hailed  or  feared  as  the  hero  of  the  pri¬ 
meval  age  before  Greece  and  Rome  were  born.3  His 
very  form  and  face  are  before  us,  with  a  vividness 
which  belongs  only  to  these  colossal  representations, 
that  refuse  to  be  forgotten.  We  see  his  profound  yet 
scornful  repose,  expressed  both  in  countenance  and 
attitude.  We  see  the  long  profile,  majestic  and  beau¬ 
tiful  beyond  any  of  his  successors  or  predecessors. 
We  see  even  the  peculiar  curl  of  his  nostrils,  and  the 
fall  of  his  under  lip.  Such  was  the  Pharaoh  who 
must  have  looked  down  on  the  Israelite  sojourners 
during  some  one  period  or  generation  of  their  stay 

1  By  Brugsch  (i.  156)  identified  3  He  reigned  for  sixty-six  years, 

with  the  Pharaoh  of  Moses.  coming  to  the  throne  very  young, 

2  Near  Sardis,  near  Beyrout,  in  like  Louis  the  Fourteenth.  Brugsch, 
Nubia,  in  Memphis,  in  Thebes.  (See  i.  137. 

Sinai  and  Palestine ,  p.  li.,  117.) 


Lect.  IV. 


EFFECTS  OF  THEIR  STAY. 


101 


in  Egypt,  probably  during  the  time  of  their  oppres¬ 
sion. 

And  such,  not  in  detail  but  in  its  general  outline, 
is  the  image  presented  to  us  by  the  Pharaoh  Pharaoh, 
of  Scripture.  There  is  no  other  king  of  the  Patri¬ 
archal  times  represented  as  nearly  on  the  same  level. 
Nimrod  the  mighty  hunter  has  been  indeed  invested, 
by  Oriental  tradition  —  perhaps  he  appears  in  Assy¬ 
rian  sculptures  —  with  something  of  the  same  sanctity 
and  majesty.  But  he  does  not  so  appear  in  any  part 
of  the  Sacred  narrative.  Pharaoh  is  the  only  poten¬ 
tate  whom  Abraham  and  Jacob  alike  approach  with 
awful  reverence.  From  Joseph  and  from  Moses  alike, 
whether  as  friend  or  foe,  he  commands  the  submissive 
respect  of  a  subject  who  can  of  himself  do  nothing 
against  the  royal  will.  “What  God  is  about  to  do 
“  He  showeth  unto  Pharaoh.”  “  I  am  of  uncircumcised 
“  lips,  and  how  shall  Pharaoh  hearken  unto  me  ?  ” 
The  supreme  oath,  by  which  safety  of  person  and 
property  is  secured,  is  “  By  the  life  of  Pharaoh.” 
King-like  and  priest-like,  he  stands  by  the  side  of  the 
sacred  river,  and  sees  in  visions  the  good  and  evil 
fortunes  of  Egypt  coming  up  from  its  stream.  At 
sunrise  he  goes  out  to  look  upon  its  beneficent  war 
ters,  as  if  it  were  all  his  own.  At  a  word  he  sum¬ 
mons  princes,  and  priests,  and  magicians,  and  wise 
men,  and  interpreters  round  him.  At  a  word  he 
plants  a  stranger  over  his  people.  “  See,  I  have  set 
“  thee  over  all  the  land  of  Egypt.  ...  I  am  Pharaoh, 
“  and  without  thee  shall  no  man  lift  up  his  hand  or 
“  his  foot  in  all  the  land  of  Egypt.”  And  when  the 
last  great  struggle  comes  on  between  his  power  and 
that  of  a  Greater  than  himself,  it  is  the  struggle  rather 
of  a  god  against  the  Lord,  than  of  a  man  against 


102 


ISRAEL  IN  EGYPT. 


Lect.  IY 


man.  He  has  hardened  his  heart  like  the  Indian  Ke- 
hama,  rather  than  like  a  mortal  prince  of  modern 
days.  If  there  were  any  prouder  state  or  loftier  dream 
in  the  primeval  monarchies  of  Central  Asia,  it  is  re¬ 
markable  that  the  Eastern  traditions  of  the  Exodus 
merge  them  in  the  person  of  the  Egyptian  sovereign ; 
and  in  the  Mahometan  version  of  the  Exodus,  Nimrod 
and  Pharaoh,  the  builder  of  the  Tower  of  Babel  and 
the  builder  of  the  Pyramids,  are  blended  together  in 
one  and  the  same  gigantic,  self-sufficing,  God-defying 
king.  He  stands  with  one  foot  on  each  of  the  two 
great  Pyramids,  and  darts  his  spear  into  the  sky  in 
the  hope  of  killing  the  Divine  Adversary,  who  from 
the  unseen  heavens  laughs  him  to  scorn.  If  we  take 
the  Pharaoh  of  Scripture  from  first  to  last,  still  the 
awful  impression  remains  the  same.  “Say  unto  Pha¬ 
raoh,”  was  the  language  even  of  one  of  the  latest 
Prophets,  how  much  more  of  these  earlier  times, — 
“  say  unto  Pharaoh,  Whom  art  thou  like  in  thy  great- 
“  ness  ?  ”  Those  who  had  lain  prostrate  under  such  a 
monarchy  would  feel  doubly  the  contrast  of  the  free¬ 
dom  into  which  they  were  called.  The  Exodus  was 
a  deliverance,  not  only  from  idolatry  of  false  divinities, 
but  from  the  idolatry  of  human  strength  and  tyranny. 
In  the  long  democracy  of  Israel,  and  the  hesitation 
with  which  that  democracy,  “where  every  man  did 
“what  was  right  in  his  own  eyes,”  was  exchanged 
even  for  the  monarchy  which  was  to  produce  a  David 
and  a  Solomon,  we  see  the  protest  against  the  awful 
form  of  government  which  had  once  bowed  them 
down. 

The  evils  of  this  ambiguous  and  degraded  state  fast 
developed  themselves.  The  old  freedom,  the  old  en¬ 
ergy,  above  all,  the  old  religion,  of  the  Patriarchal  age 


Lect.  IY. 


EFFECTS  OF  THEIR  STAY. 


103 


faded  away.  Not  in  the  Pentateuch,  but  in  the  later 
books,  the  participation  of  Israel  in  the  idolatry  of 
Egypt  is  expressly  stated.  “  Your  fathers  served  other 
“  gods  .  .  in  Egypt.” 1  “  They  forsook  not  the  idols 

“  of  Egypt.” 2  The  Sabbath,  if  it  had  existed  in  some 
shape  amongst  their  fathers,  as  seems  likely,  was  for¬ 
gotten  ;  the  rite  of  circumcision,  by  which  the  cove¬ 
nant  with  God  had  been  made,  fell  into  disuse ;  its 
loss  became  a  reproach  in  the  eyes  even  of  their 
Egyptian  masters,  to  whom,  as  to  the  rest  of  the  an¬ 
cient  Eastern  world,  it  was  a  necessary  sign  of  all 
cleanliness  and  of  all  civilization.3  Like  slaves,  too, 
like  all  those  wandering  populations  which  hang  at 
the  gates  of  nations  or  classes  more  wealthy  and  more 
stable  than  themselves,  they  learned  to  cling  with  a 
kind  of  sensual  affection  to  the  land  of  their  bondage, 
to  the  green  meadows  of  the  Nile  valley,  to  “  the 
“  flesh-pots,  and  melons,  and  cucumbers,  and  onions,” 
which  it  gave  them  in  profusion ;  to  the  land  u  where 
“  they  sowed  their  seed  and  watered  it  with  their 
“foot,  as  a  garden  of  herbs.”  We  shall  have  to  bear 
this  in  mind  during  their  whole  subsequent  history, 
in  order  to  appreciate  both  the  necessity  and  the  ef¬ 
fect  of  the  vicissitudes  which  were  dispensed  to  them. 
The  bare  Desert  and  the  bald  hills  of  Palestine  formed 
a  wholesome  and  perpetual  contrast  to  the  magnifi¬ 
cence  and  the  fertility  of  Egypt.  They  formed,  as  it 
were,  a  natural  Monasticism,  a  natural  Puritanism, — 
in  which  the  luxuries,  and  the  superstitions,  and  the 
barbarism  of  their  servile  state  were  set  aside  by 
sterner  and  higher  influences.  But  they  were  always 
taught,  with  pathetic  earnestness,  never  to  forget,  nay 

1  Josh.  xxiv.  2,  14.  3  Ex.  iv.  24;  Josh.  v.  2-9. 

2  Ezek.  xx.  8. 


104 


ISRAEL  IN  EGYPT. 


Lect.  IV 


even,  in  a  certain  sense,  to  feel  for  and  with,  the 
condition  of  slavery  which  had  been  their  original 
portion.  “Remember  that  thou  wast  a  ‘ slave’  in  the 
“land  of  Egypt.”  On  this  recollection,  as  on  an  im¬ 
movable  thought  never  to  be  erased  from  their  minds, 
are  made  to  repose  even  the  great  institutions  of  the 
Sabbath  and  the  Jubilee.1 

3.  There  were  two  other  traces  of  their  dependent 
Leprosy,  position  in  Egypt,  which  may  be  noticed  as 
having  left  indelible  marks  both  on  their  records  and 
those  of  the  nation  which  cast  them  out.  One  is 
the  disease  of  leprosy,2 — which  for  the  first  time 
appears  after  the  stay  in  Egypt, — is  it  too  much 
to  suppose  ?  —  generated  by  the  habits  incident  to 
their  depressed  state  and  crowded  population.  In  the 
Israelite  annals  it  appears  only  in  individual  though 
most  significant  instances, — the  hand  of  Moses,  the 
face  of  Miriam.  But  the  severe  provisions  of  the  Le- 
vitical  law  imply  its  wider  spread ;  and  in  the  Egyp¬ 
tian  traditions  the  remembrance,  as  was  natural,  took 
a  stronger  and  more  general  color  of  aversion  and 
disgust,  and  represented  the  whole  people  as  a  nation 
of  lepers,  cast  out  on  that  account. 

4.  The  other  relic  of  repugnance  between  the  two 

The  use  of  races>'  though  slight  in  itself,  is  both  more 
the  Ass.  deeply  seated  in  their  original  diversity  of 
customs,  and  more  lasting  in  its  results.  There  is  one 
animal  which,  even  more  than  the  camel,  is  from  first 
to  last  identified  with  the  history  of  Israel.  With 
he-asses  and  she-asses  Abraham  returned  from  Egypt ; 
with  the  ass  Abraham  went  up  with  Isaac  to  the 
sacrifice ; 3  on  asses  Joseph’s  brethren  came  thither ; 

1  Deut.  v.  15,  vi.  21 ;  Lev.  xxv.  2  Jos.  c.  Apion ,  i.  26,  34. 

42,  55.  3  Gen.  xxii.  3,  5. 


Lect.  IY. 


EFFECTS  OF  THEIR  STAY. 


105 


on  an  ass  Moses  set  his  wife  and  his  sons  on  his 
return  from  Arabia  to  Egppt ; 1  an  old  man  seated  on 
an  ass  was  the  likeness  of  him  which,  according  to 
Gentile  traditions,2  his  countrymen  delighted  to  honor. 
On  white  asses  or  mules,  through  the  whole  period 
of  the  early  history 3  till  their  first  contact  with 
foreign  nations  in  the  reign  of  Solomon,  their  princes 
rode  in  state ;  the  prophecy,  fulfilled  in  the  close  of 
their  history,  was  that  "  their  King  should  come 
"riding  on  an  ass,  and  a  colt  the  foal  of  an  ass.”  It 
was  the  long-continued  mark  of  their  ancient,  pas¬ 
toral,  simple  condition.  The  rival  horse  came  into 
Palestine  slowly  and  unlawfully,  and  was  always  spoken 
of  as  the  sign  of  the  pride  and  power  of  Egypt ;  in 
the  funeral  procession  of  Jacob  the  chariots  and  horses 
of  Egypt  are  specially  contrasted  with  the  asses  of 
the  sons  of  Israel ;  they  who  in  later  times  put  their 
trust  in  Egypt  founded  that  trust  in  her  chariots  and 
horses.  But  we  know  not  only  the  Israelite,  but  the 
Egyptian  feeling  also.  Whilst  on  the  Theban  monu¬ 
ments  the  war-horse  is  always  at  hand,  the  ass,  in 
their  minds,  was  regarded  as  the  exclusive,  the  con¬ 
temned,  symbol  of  the  nomadic  race  who  had  left 
them.  On  asses  they  were  described  as  flying  from 
Egypt ; 4  asses,  it  was  believed,  had  guided  them 
through  the  desert ; 5  in  the  Holy  of  Holies  (to  such 
a  pitch  of  exaggeration  was  the  story  carried)  the 
mysterious  object  of  Jewish  worship  was  held  to  be 
an  ass’s  head ;  and  so  deeply  and  so  generally  was 
this  persuasion  communicated  to  the  heathen  world, 

1  Exod.  iv.  20. 

2  Diod.  Sic.  xxxiv.  1. 

3  Judg.  v.  10,  x.  4,  xii.  14 ;  2  Sam. 

xvi.  1,  2;  1  Kings  i.  33,  38. 

14 


4  Plutarch  de  I  side,  ch.  31. 

5  Tac.  Hist.  v.  3.  See  Lecture  VI. 


106 


ISRAEL  IN  EGYPT. 


Lect.  IY 


that  when  a  new  Jewish  sect,  as  it  was  thought,  arose 
under  the  name  of  “  Christian,”  the  favorite  theme  of 
reproach  and  of  caricature  was  that  they  worshipped 
in  like  manner  an  ass,  the  son  of  an  ass,  even  on  the 
Cross  itself. 1  So  long  and  far  were  the  effects  visible 
of  this  primitive  diversity  between  the  civilized  king¬ 
dom  of  the  Pharaohs  and  the  pastoral  tribe  of  the  land 
of  Goshen.  So  innocent  was  the  occasion  of  this  long¬ 
standing  calumny,  —  a  calumny  not  of  generations  or 
centuries,  but  of  millenniums’  growth  before  it  was 
dispelled ;  perhaps  the  most  remarkable  of  all  the 
many  like  slanders  and  fables  invented,  in  the  course 
of  ecclesiastical  history,  by  the  bitterness  of  national 
or  theological  hatred. 

5.  Such  are  some  of  the  points,  greater  or  smaller, 
of  lasting  antagonism  which  their  original  relations 

Points  of  left  between  Egypt  and  Israel.  But  there  are 
contact.  ajg0  p0jn^g  0f  contact.  It  would  be  against 

the  analogy  of  the  whole  history,  to  suppose  that  this 
long  period  was  wasted  in  its  effect  on  the  mind  of 
the  Chosen  People ;  that  the  same  Divine  Providence 
which  in  later  times  drew  new  truths  out  of  the  Chal- 
dsean  captivity  for  the  Jewish  Church,  out  of  the 
Grecian  philosophy  and  the  Roman  law  for  the 
Christian  Church,  should  have  made  no  use  of  the 
greatness  of  Egypt  in  this  first  and  most  important 
stage  of  the  education  of  Israel. 

We  need  not  go  to  heathen  records  for  the  assur¬ 
ance  that  Moses  was  “learned  in  all  the  wisdom  of 
“  the  Egyptians.”  Whatever  that  wisdom  was,  we  can¬ 
not  doubt  it  was  turned  to  its  own  good  purpose  in 
the  laws  through  him  revealed  to  the  people  of  God. 

1  The  Palatine  inscription  (Dublin  Rev.  April,  1857).  Josephus,  c.  Ap. 
ii.  7  ;  Tertullian,  Apol.  ch.  16. 


Lect.  IV. 


EFFECTS  OF  THEIR  STAY. 


107 


The  very  minuteness  of  the  law  implies  a  stage  of 
existence  different  to  that  in  which  the  Patriarchs 
had  lived,  but  like  to  that  in  which  we  know  that 
the  Egyptians  lived.  The  forms  of  some  of  the  most 
solemn  sacrifices  —  as,  for  example,  the  scapegoat  — 
are  almost  identical.  The  white  linen  dresses  of  the 
priests,  the  Urim  and  Thummim  on  the  high-priest’s 
breast-plate,  are,  to  all  appearance,  derived  from  the 
same  source  as  the  analogous  emblems  amongst  the 
Egyptians.  The  sacred  ark,  as  portrayed  on  the 
monuments,  can  hardly  fail  to  have  some  relation  to 
that  which  was  borne  by  the  Levites  at  the  head  of 
the  host,  and  which  was  finally  enshrined  in  the  Tem¬ 
ple.  The  Temple,  at  least  in  some  of  its  most  re¬ 
markable  features,  —  its  courts,  its  successive  chambers, 
and  its  adytum,  or  Holy  of  Holies,  —  is  more  like  those 
of  Egypt  than  any  others  of  the  ancient  world  with 
which  we  are  acquainted.  In  these  and  in  many 
other  instances  we  may  fairly  trace  a  true  affiliation 
of  such  outward  customs  and  forms,  as  in  like  manner, 
at  a  later  period,  the  Christian  Church  took  from  the 
Pagan  ritual  of  the  empire  in  which  it  had  sojourned 
for  its  four  hundred  years.  It  is  but  an  expansion 
of  the  one  fact  which  has  always  arrested  the  atten¬ 
tion  of  commentators,  and  which  in  its  widest  sense 
is  a  salutary  warning  against  despising  the  greatness 
and  the  wisdom  of  the  heathen. 

“  This  world  of  thine,  by  him  usurp’d  too  long, 

Now  opens  all  her  stores  to  heal  thy  servants’  wrong.” 1 

Rachel  carried  off  her  father’s  teraphim  from  Meso¬ 
potamia  ;  the  wives  and  daughters  of  Israel  carried  off 
from  Egypt  the  sacred  gems  and  vestments,  which 

1  Ewald,  ii.  87,  8,  on  Exod.  iii.  22;  xii.  45.  Keble’s  Christian  Year  (3d 
S.  in  Lent). 


108 


ISRAEL  IN  EGYPT. 


Lect.  IV. 


afterwards  served  to  adorn  the  priestly  services  of  the 
Tabernacle.  “  When  ye  go,  ye  shall  not  go  empty. 
“  But  every  woman  shall  borrow  of  her  neighbour  .  .  . 
“  jewels  of  silver,  and  jewels  of  gold,  and  raiment,  and 
“ye  shall  put  them  upon  your  sons  and  upon  your 
“  daughters.  .  .  .  And  the  Lord  gave  the  people 
“  favour  in  the  sight  of  the  Egyptians,  so  that  they 
“  lent  unto  them  such  things  as  they  required,  and 
“  they  spoiled  the  Egyptians.” 

Yet  the  contrast  was  always  greater  than  the  like- 
Points  of  ness.  When  we  survey  the  vast  array  of  an¬ 
cient  ideas  represented  to  us  in  the  Egyptian 
temples  and  sepulchres,  the  thought  forced  upon  us  is 
rather  of  the  fewness  than  of  the  frequency  of  illus¬ 
trations  which  they  furnish.  Of  this  absence  of  in¬ 
fluence  perhaps  the  most  remarkable  instance  lies  in 
the  fact  that  whilst  the  Egyptian  sculptures  abound 
with  representations  of  the  future  state,  and  of  the 
judgment  after  death,  the  Jewish  Scriptures,  at  least 
in  the  Pentateuch,  abstain  almost  entirely  from  any 
direct  or  distinct  mention  of  either.  A  wider  connec¬ 
tion,  indeed,  might  be  maintained  if  we  could  trust 
the  later  descriptions  of  Egyptian  theology  and  philos¬ 
ophy.  It  was  strongly  believed  in  the  Greek  schools 
of  Alexandria,  that  behind  the  multitude  of  forms, 
human,  divine,  bestial,  grotesque,  which  filled  the 
Egyptian  shrines,  there  was  yet  in  the  minds  of  the 
sacred  and  the  learned  few  a  deep-seated  belief  in 
One  Supreme  Intelligence,  and  thus  the  distinguishing 
mark  of  the  Mosiac  Revelation  would  have  been,  not 
so  much  that  it  disclosed  and  insisted  on  this  funda¬ 
mental  truth,  but  that  what  had  been  hitherto  confined 
to  a  priestly  caste  was  for  the  first  time  made  the  com¬ 
mon  property  of  a  whole  people.  Such  may  possibly 


Lect.  IV. 


EFFECTS  OF  THEIR  STAY. 


109 


have  been  the  case.  But  it  is  not  the  natural  impres¬ 
sion  left  by  the  monuments.  The  crowd  of  gods  and 
goddesses,  above  all,  the  overwhelming  deification  of 
the  Pharaohs,  of  which  I  have  before  spoken,  seems 
almost  impossible  to  reconcile  with  any  strong  Mono¬ 
theistic  belief  in  Egypt,  however  far  withdrawn  into 
the  recesses  of  schools  or  priesthoods.  One  ever-re¬ 
curring  symbol,  however,  of  such  a  belief  appears  in 
color  and  sculpture  on  the  Egyptian  monuments,  as  in 
the  Hebrew  records  it  appears  also  both  in  word  and 
act.  Everywhere,  but  especially  under  the  portal  of 
every  Temple,  are  stretched  out  the  wide-spread  wings, 
—  blue,  as  if  with  the  cloudless  blue  of  the  overarch¬ 
ing  heavens,  —  covering  the  sanctuary,  as  if  with  the 
shelter  of  some  invisible  protector.  This  may  be  the 
accidental  recurrence  of  a  symbol  simply  and  naturally 
expressive  of  a  beneficent  overruling  Power.  But  it 
is  the  nearest  authentic  approach  which  the  Egyptian 
monuments  furnish  to  such  an  idea.  It  is  the  image 
to  which,  in  one  sublime  passage,  at  least,  the  Divine 
presence  is  directly  compared,  “  as  it  were  a  paved  work 
“  of  a  sapphire  stone ,  as  it  were  the  body  of  heaven  in 
“  his  clearness.” 1  It  is  an  exact  likeness  of  the  wings 
which  formed  the  covering  of  the  ark  in  the  Taber¬ 
nacle  and  the  Temple,  —  of  the  feeling  which  has  been 
made  immortal  in  the  words,  “  Under  the  shadow  of 
“  Thy  wings  shall  be  my  refuge.” 2 

1  Ex.  xxiv.  10.  Compare  our  own  of  the  detailed  relations  of  Egyptian 

use  of  the  word  “  Heaven.”  to  Israelite  history,  see  Hengsten 

2  Ps.  lvii.  1.  For  the  amplification  berg’s  Egypt  and  the  Books  of  Moses 


. 


' 


.  - 


-• 


• 

• 

• 

' 


..  ■ 

.  ■ 


MOSES. 


- ♦ - 

V.  THE  EXODUS. 

VI.  THE  WILDERNESS. 

VII.  SINAI  AND  THE  LAW. 

VIII.  KADESH  AND  PISGAH. 


SPECIAL  AUTHORITIES  FOR  THIS  PERIOD. 


1.  (a)  The  last  four  books  of  the  Pentateuch  (Hebrew  and  Sep- 

tuagint). 

(b)  Ps.  lxxvii.  12-20  ;  Ixxviii.  12-54 ;  lxxxi.  5-16  ;  xc. ;  xcv.  8-11 ; 
cv.  23-44;  cvi.  7-33;  cxiv. ;  cxxxv.  8-9  ;  cxxxvi.  10-16: 
Isa.  lxiii.  11-14:  Hos.  xii.  13  :  Micah  vi.  4—9  :  Ecclus.  xlv. 
1-22  :  2  Macc.  ii.  10. 

2.  The  Jewish  traditions,  preserved 

(a)  In  the  New  Testament  (Acts  vii.  20-38  ;  2  Tim.  iii.  8,  9  ; 

Heb.  xi.  23-28 ;  Jude  9)  :  in  Josephus  {Ant.  ii.  9-iv.  8,  49)  : 
and  Philo  (De  vita  Moysis ). 

(b)  In  the  Talmud,  the  Targum  Pseudojonatlian,  and  the  Midrashim  ; 

extracted  in  Otho’s  Lexicon  rabbinicum. . 

3.  The  Heathen  traditions  of  Eupolemus,  Artapanus,  Ezekielus,  and 

Demetrius  (Eusebius,  Prcep.  Ev.  ix.  26-29) :  Manetho,  Chsere- 
mon,  Lysimachus  (Josephus,  c.  Apion ,  i.  26-34)  :  Apion  ( ib .  ii. 
2)  :  Strabo  (xvi.  2) :  Diodorus  Siculus  (xxxiv.  1,  xl.  from  He- 
catseus)  :  Tacitus  (Hist.  v.  3,  4)  :  Justin  (xxxvi.  2) :  Clemens 
Alexandrinus  Stromata ,  i.  22-25. 

4.  The  Mussulman  traditions  in  the  Koran,  ii.  v.  vii.  x.  xi.  xviii.  xx. 

xxviii.  xl. ;  collected  in  Lane’s  Selections  from  the  Kur-an ,  §§ 
xv.  xvi.;  Weil’s  Biblical  Legends ,  p.  91;  D’Herbelot’s  Bibl. 
Orientale  (“  Moussa,”  “  Caroun  ”  i.  e.  Korah,  “  Feraoun  ”)  ;  and 
Jalaladdfn,  ch.  xvi. 

5.  The  Christian  traditions  in  Apocryphal  books:  —  (1)  Prayers  of 

Moses,  (2)  Apocalypse  of  Moses,  (3)  Ascension  of  Moses,  (4) 
Prophecy  of  Balaam,  Book  of  Jannes  and  Jambres,  &c.,  in  Fa- 
bricius,  Cod.  Pseudepigr.  Vet.  Test.  i.  801-871. 


MOSES. 


LECTURE  V. 

THE  EXODUS. 

The  History,  strictly  speaking,  of  the  Jewish  church 
begins  with  the  Exodus.  In  one  sense,  indeed,  “  His- 
“  tory  herself  was  born  on  that  night  when  Moses  led 
“  forth  his  countrymen  from  the  land  of  Goshen.” 1 
Traditions,  genealogies,  institutions,  isolated  incidents, 
isolated  characters,  may  be  discovered  here  and  there, 
long  before.  In  Pagan  records  there  is  no  continuous 
narrative  of  events.  In  the  sacred  records,  whatever 
history  exists  is  the  history  of  a  man,  of  a  family,  of 
a  tribe,  but  not  of  a  people,  a  nation,  a  commonwealth. 
This  marked  beginning,  visible  even  in  the  Jewish 
annals  themselves,  is  yet  more  clearly  brought  out, 
when  considered  from  an  external  point  of  view.  To 
the  outer  heathen  world  the  earlier  period  of  the 
Hebrew  race,  with  the  single  exception  of  Abraham, 
was  an  entire  blank.  Their  origin  in  the  far  East, 
their  first  settlement  in  Canaan,  the  name  of  their 
first  father,  whether  Jacob  or  Israel,  these  were  all 
but  unknown  to  Greeks  and  Romans.  It  is  the  Exodus 
that  reveals  the  Israelite  to  the  eyes  of  Europe. 
Egypt  was  the  only  land  which  the  Gentile  inquirers 
recognized  as  the  birthplace  of  the  Jews.  Moses  was 

1  Bunsen’s  Egypt,  i.  23. 


15 


114 


THE  EXODUS. 


lect.  y. 


the  character  who  first  appears,  not  only  as  the  law¬ 
giver,  but  as  the  representative  of  the  nation.  In 
many  wild,  distorted  forms  the  rise  of  this  great 
name,  the  apparition  of  this  strange  people  was  con¬ 
ceived.  Let  us  take  the  brief  account  —  the  best  that 
has  been  handed  down  to  us  —  from  the  careful  and 
truth-loving  Strabo. 

"Moses,  an  Egyptian  priest,  who  possessed  a  con- 
"  siderable  tract  of  Lowrer  Egypt,  unable  longer  to 
"  bear  with  what  existed  there,  departed  thence  to 
"  Syria,  and  with  him  went  out  many  who  honored 
"the  Divine  Being  (to  ©eiw).  For  Moses  maintained 
"  and  taught  that  the  Egyptians  were  not  right  in 
"  likening  the  nature  of  God  to  beasts  and  cattle,  nor 
"  yet  the  Africans,  nor  even  the  Greeks,  in  fashioning 
"  their  gods  in  the  form  of  men.  He  held  that  this 
"only  was  God, — that  which  encompasses  all  of  us, 
"  earth  and  sea,  that  which  we  call  Heaven,  and  the 
"  Order  of  the  world,  and  the  Nature  of  things.  Of 
"  this  who  that  had  any  sense  would  venture  to  in- 
"  vent  an  image  like  to  anything  which  exists 
"amongst  ourselves?  Ear  better  to  abandon  all  stab 
"  uary  and  sculpture,  all  setting  apart  of  sacred  pre- 
"  cincts  and  shrines,  and  to  pay  reverence,  without 
"  any-  image  whatever.  The  course  prescribed  was, 
"  that  those  who  have  the  gift  of  good  divinations, 
"  for  themselves  or  for  others,  should  compose  them- 
"  selves  to  sleep  within  the  Temple ;  and  those  who 
"  live  temperately  and  justly  may  expect  to  receive 
"  some  good  gift  from  God,  —  these  always,  and  none 
"  besides.” 1 

1  Strabo,  xvi.  760.  He  probably  further  and  less  accurate  details  in 
takes  his  account  from  Hecataeus  (see  Diodorus  (xl.). 

Ewald,  ii.  74),  which  is  given  with 


Lect  Y. 


THE  BIRTH  OF  MOSES. 


115 

These  words,  unconsciously  introduced  in  the  work 
of  the  Cappadocian  geographer,  occupying  but  a  single 
section  of  a  single  chapter  in  the  seventeen  books  of  his 
voluminous  treatise,  awaken  in  us  something  of  the  same 
feeling  as  that  with  which  we  read  the  short  epistle  of 
Pliny,  describing  with  equal  unconsciousness,  yet  with 
equal  truth,  the  first  appearance  of  the  new  Christian 
society  which  was  to  change  the  face  of  mankind.  With 
but  a  few  trifling  exceptions,  Strabo’s  account  is,  from 
his  point  of  view,  a  faithful  summary  of  the  mission 
of  Moses.  What  a  curiosity  it  would  have  roused  in 
our  minds,  had  this  been  all  that  remained  to  us  con¬ 
cerning  him !  That  curiosity  we  are  enabled  to  gratify 
from  books  which  lay  within  Strabo’s  reach,  though 
he  cared  not  to  read  them.  Let  us  unfold  from  their 
ancient  pages  the  leading  points  of  the  signal  deliv¬ 
erance,  when  a  Israel  came  out  of  Egypt,  and  the 
“  house  of  Jacob  from  among  the  strange  people.” 

The  life  of  Moses,  in  the  later  period  of  the  Jew¬ 
ish  history,  was  divided  into  three  equal  portions  of 
forty  years  each.1  This  agrees  with  the  natural  ar¬ 
rangement  of  his  history  into  the  three  parts,  of  his 
Egyptian  education,  his  exile  in  Arabia,  and  his  gov¬ 
ernment  of  the  Israelite  nation  in  the  Wilderness  and 
on  the  confines  of  Palestine.  But  whilst  the  first  two 
will  be  contained  in  the  present  Lecture,  the  last  ex¬ 
tends  itself  over  the  rest  of  this  portion  of  the  his¬ 
tory. 

I.  The  early  period  of  the  life  of  Moses,  as  related 
in  the  Pentateuch,  is  so  closely  bound  up  with  the 
later  traditions  concerning  it,  that  it  may  be  well  to 
present  it  in  the  form  in  which  it  appeared  to  his 
nation  at  the  time  of  the  Christian  era.  His  birth2 


1  Acts  vii.  23,  30. 


8  Jos.  Ant.  ii.  9,  §  2-4. 


116  THE  EXODUS.  Lect.  V. 

—  so  ran  the  story  —  had  been  foretold  to  Pharaoh 
The  birth  by  the  Egyptian  magicians,  and  to  his  father 
of  Moses.  Amram  by  a  dream,  as  respectively  the  future 
destroyer  and  deliverer.  The  pangs  of  his  mother’s 
labor  were  alleviated  so  as  to  enable  her  to  evade  the 
Egyptian  midwives.  The  beauty  of  the  new-born  babe 

—  in  the  later  version  of  the  story  amplified  into  a 
beauty  and  size  almost  divine  1  —  induced  the  mother  to 
make  extraordinary  efforts  for  its  preservation  from  the 
general  destruction  of  the  male  children  of  Israel.  For 
three  months  the  child,  under  the  name  of  Joachim, 
was  concealed  in  the  house.  Then  his  mother  placed 
him  in  a  small  boat  or  basket  of  papyrus  (perhaps 
from  a  current  Egyptian2  belief  that  that  plant  was 
a  protection  from  crocodiles),  closed  against  the  water 
by  bitumen.  This  was  placed  among  the  aquatic 
vegetation  by  the  side  of  one  of  the  canals  of  the 
Nile.  The  mother  departed  as  if  unable  to  bear  the 
sight.  The  sister  lingered  to  watch  her  brother’s  fate. 
The  basket  floated3  down  the  stream. 

The  princess 4  came  down,  in  primitive  simplicity, 
Hiseduca-  to  bathe  in  the  sacred  river.  Her  attendant 

i  • 

slaves  followed  her.  She  saw  the  basket  in 
the  flags,  or  borne  down  the  stream,  and  despatched 
divers  after  it.  The  divers,  or  one  of  the  female 
slaves,  brought  it.  It  was  opened,  and  the  cry  of  the 
child  moved  the  princess  to  compassion.  She  deter¬ 
mined  to  rear  it  as  her  own.  The  sister  was  then  at 
hand  to  recommend  a  Hebrew  nurse.  The  child  was 
brought  up  as  the  princess’s  son,  and  the  memory  of 

1  Jos.  Ant.  ii.  9,  §  1,  5.  ’A cteZoq  t«  4  Thermuthis  (Jos.  Ibid.  §  5),  or 

9ew,  Acts  vii.  20.  Merrliis  (Artap.  in  Eusebius),  daugh- 

2  Plut.  Is.  et  Os.  358.  ter  of  the  king  of  Heliopolis,  wife  of 

3  Jos.  Ant.  ii.  9,  §  4.  the  king  of  Memphis. 


lect.  v. 


MOSES  IN  EGYPT. 


117 


the  incident  was  long  cherished  in  the  name  given  to 
the  foundling  of  the  water’s  side  —  whether  according 
to  its  Hebrew  or  Egyptian  form.  Its  Hebrew  form  is 
Mosheh,  from  masah ,  “  to  draw  out” — “because  I  have 
“  drawn  him  out  of  the  water.”  But  this  is  probably 
the  Hebrew  termination  given  to  an  Egyptian  word 
signifying  “  saved  from  the  water.” 1  The  “  Child  of 
the  water”  was  adopted  by  the  childless  princess.  Its 
beauty  came  to  be  such,  that  passers-by  stood  fixed 
to  look  at  it,  and  laborers  left  their  work  to  steal  a 
glance.2  Such  was  the  narrative,  as  moulded  by  suc¬ 
cessive  generations,  and  finally  adopted  by  Josephus 
and  Clement  of  Alexandria,  from  the  simpler,  but  still 
thoroughly  Egyptian,  incidents  of  the  Biblical  story. 

From  this  time  for  many  years  Moses  must  be  con¬ 
sidered  as  an  Egyptian.  In  the  Pentateuch,  whether 
from  absence  of  authentic  information,  or  stern  disdain, 
or  native  simplicity,  this  period  is  a  blank.  But  the 
well-known  words  of  Stephen’s  speech,  which  describes 
him3  as  “learned  in  all  the  wisdom  of  the  Egyptians”  and 
“mighty  in  words  and  deeds ,”  are  in  fact  a  brief  sum¬ 
mary  of  the  Jewish  and  Egyptian  traditions  which  fill 
up  the  silence  of  the  Hebrew  annals.  He  wTas  edu¬ 
cated  at  Heliopolis,4  and  grew  up  there  as  a  priest, 
under  his  Egyptian  name  of  Osarsiph5  or  Tisithen.6 


1  In  Coptic,  mo  —  water,  and  usTie 
<==  saved.  This  is  the  explanation 
given  by  Josephus  (Ant.  ii.  9,  6 ;  c. 
Apion,  i.  31),  and  confirmed  by  the 
Greek  form  of  the  word  adopted  in 
the  LXX.,  Mwvofjc;,  and  thence  in 
the  Vulgate,  Moyses  (French  Mo'ise). 
This  form  is  retained  in  the  Au¬ 
thorized  Version  of  1611,  in  2  Mac¬ 
cabees  —  “  Moises.”  In  the  later 
editions  it  is  altered.  Brugsch  (His- 


toire  d’Egypte,  157,  173)  renders  the 
name  Mes  or  Messon  —  child,  borne 
by  one  of  the  princes  of  Ethiopia 
under  Rameses  II.,  as  also  in  the 
names  Amosis  and  Thuth-Jk/osw. 

2  Jos.  Ant.  ii.  9,  §  6. 

3  Acts  vii.  22. 

4  Compare  Strabo,  xvii.  1. 

5  “  Osarsiph  ”  is  derived  by  Mane- 
tho  from  Osiris.  Jos.  c.  Ap.  i.  26,  31 

6  Chaeremon,  Ibid.  32. 


118 


THE  EXODUS. 


lect.  v. 


“  He  learned  arithmetic,  geometry,  astronomy,  medi- 
“  cine,  and  music.  He  invented  boats  and  engines  for 
“  building  —  instruments  of  war  and  of  hydraulics  — 
“  hieroglyphics  —  division  of  lands”  He  taught  Or¬ 
pheus,  and  was  hence  called  by  the  Greeks  Musaeus,1 
and  by  the  Egyptians  Hermes.  He  was  sent  on  an 
expedition  against  the  Ethiopians.  He  got  rid  of  the 
serpents  of  the  country  to  be  traversed  by  letting 
loose  baskets  full  of  ibises  upon  them.2  The  city  of 
Hermopolis  was  believed  to  have  been  founded  to 
commemorate  his  victory.3  He  advanced  to  the  capi¬ 
tal  of  Ethiopia,  and  gave  it  the  name  of  Meroe,  from 
his  adopted  mother  Merrhis,  whom  he  buried  there. 
Tharbis,  the  daughter  of  the  king  of  Ethiopia,4  fell  in 
love  with  him,  and  he  returned  in  triumph  to  Egypt 
with  her  as  his  wife.6 

The  original  account  reopens  with  the  time  when 
he  was  resolved  to  reclaim  his  nationality.  Here, 
again,  the  Epistle  to  the  Hebrews,  following  in  the 
same  track  as  Stephen’s  speech,  preserves  the  tradition 
in  a  distincter  form  than  the  narrative  of  the  Penta¬ 
teuch.  “  Moses,  when  he  was  come  to  years,  refused 
“  to  be  called  the  son  of  Pharaoh’s  daughter ;  choosing 
“  rather  to  suffer  affliction  with  the  people  of  God 
“  than  to  enjoy  the  pleasures  of  sin  for  a  season ;  es- 
“  teeming  the  reproach  of  Christ  greater  riches  than 
“  the  treasures  (the  ancient  accumulated  treasures  of 
“  Khampsinitus  and  the  old  kings)  of  Egypt.” 6  In  his 
earliest  infancy  he  was  reported  to  have  refused  the 
milk  of  Egyptian  nurses,  and,  when  three  years  old, 
to  have  trampled  under  his  feet  the  crown  which 


1  Artapanus,  in  Eusebius. 

2  Jos.  Ant.  ii.  10,  §  2. 

3  Artapanus. 


4  Comp.  Num.  xii.  1. 

5  Jos.  Ant.  ii.  10,  §  2. 

6  Heb.  xi.  24-26. 


lect.  v. 


MOSES  IN  EGYPT. 


119 


Pharaoh  had  playfully  placed  on  his  head.1  According 
to  the  Egyptian  tradition,  although  a  priest  of  Heli¬ 
opolis,  he  always  performed  his  prayers  according  to 
the  custom  of  his  fathers,  outside  the  walls  of  the  city, 
in  the  open  air,  turning  towards  the  sunrising.2  The 
king  was  excited  to  hatred  by  his  own  envy,  or  by 
the  priests  of  Egypt,  who  foresaw  their  destroyer.3 
Various  plots  of  assassination  were  contrived  against 
him,  which  failed.  The  last  was  after  he  had  His  escape, 
already  escaped  across  the  Nile  from  Memphis,  warned 
by  his  brother  Aaron,  and  when  pursued  by  the  as¬ 
sassin  he  killed  him.  The  same  general  account  of 
conspiracies  against  his  life  appears  in  Josephus.4  All 
that  remains  of  these  traditions  in  the  Sacred  narra¬ 
tive  is  the  single  and  natural  incident,  that  seeing  an 
Israelite  suffering  the  bastinado  from  an  Egyptian,  and 
thinking  that  they  were  alone,  he  slew  the  Egyptian 
(the  later  tradition  said,5  “  with  a  word  of  his  mouth  ”), 
and  buried  the  corpse  in  the  sand,  —  the  sand  of  the 
desert,  then,  as  now,  running  close  up  to  the  culti¬ 
vated  tract.  The  same  fire  of  patriotism  which  thus 
roused  him  as  a  deliverer  from  the  oppressors,  turns 
him  into  the  peace-maker  of  the  oppressed.  It  is  char¬ 
acteristic  of  the  faithfulness  of  the  Sacred  records 
that  his  flight  is  occasioned  rather  by  the  malignity  of 
his  countrymen  than  by  the  enmity  of  the  Egyptians. 
And  in  Stephen’s  speech6  it  is  this  part  of  the  story 
which  is  drawn  out  at  greater  length  than  in  the 
original,  evidently  with  the  view  of  showing  the  iden¬ 
tity  of  the  narrow  spirit  which  had  thus  displayed 
itself  equally  against  their  first  and  the  last  Deliverer. 

1  Jos.  Ant.  ii.  9,  §  5,  7.  4  Ant.  ii.  10,  §  1. 

2  Id.  c.  Apion ,  ii.  2.  5  Clem.  Alex.  Strom,  i.  23. 

3  Artapanus.  6  Acts  vii.  23-39. 


120 


THE  EXODUS. 


lect.  v. 


II.  Where  these  later  traditions  end,  the  Sacred 
The  call  of  history  begins.  Whatever  may  have  been  the 
M°ses.  preparation  provided  by  Egyptian  war  or  wis¬ 
dom,  it  is  in  the  unknown,  unfrequented  wilderness 
of  Arabia,  —  in  the  same  school  of  solitude  and  of 
exile,  which  in  humbler  spheres  has  so  often  trained 
great  minds  to  the  reception  of  new  truths,  —  that  the 
mission  of  Moses  was  revealed  to  him.  In  that  won¬ 
derful  region  of  the  earth,  where  the  grandeur  of 
mountains  is  combined,  as  hardly  anywhere  else,  with 
the  grandeur  of  the  desert,  —  amidst  the  granite 
precipices  and  the  silent  valleys  of  Horeb,  —  as  to  his 
people  afterwards,  so  to  Moses  now  was  the  great 
truth  to  be  made  manifest,  of  which,  as  we  have  seen, 
he  was  recognized  even  by  the  heathen  world  to  have 
been  the  first  national  interpreter.  “  Now  Moses  kept 
“  the  flock  of  Jethro  his  father-in-law,  the  Priest  of 
“  Midian :  and  he  led  the  flock  to  the  back  of  the 
“  wilderness  ”  far  from  the  shores  of  the  Bed  Sea, 
where  Jethro  seems  to  have  dwelt,  “  and  came  to  the 
“  mountain  of  God,  even  to  Horeb.”  We  know  not 
the  precise  place.  Tradition,  reaching  back  to  the  sixth 
century  of  the  Christian  era,  fixes  it  in  the  same  deep 
seclusion  as  that  to  which  in  all  probability  he  after¬ 
wards  led  the  Israelites.  The  convent  of  Justinian 
is  built  over  what  was  supposed  to  be  the  exact  spot 
where  the  shepherd  was  bid  to  draw  his  sandals  from 
off  his  feet.  The  valley  in  which  the  convent  stands 
is  called  by  the  Arabian  name  of  Jethro.1  But  whether 
this,  or  the  other  great  centre  of  the  peninsula,  Mount 
Serbal,  be  regarded  as  the  scene  of  the  event,  the 
appropriateness  would  be  almost  equal.  Each  has  at 
different  times  been  regarded  as  the  sanctuary  of  the 

1  Shoaib  =  Hobab  (Evvald,  Gesch.  ii.  58,  note). 


Lect.  v. 


THE  CALL  OF  MOSES. 


121 


desert.  Each  presents  that  singular  majesty,  which,  as 
Josephus  tells  us,1  and  as  the  sacred  narrative  implies, 
had  already  invested  “  The  Mountain  of  God  ”  with  an 
awful  reverence  in  the  eyes  of  the  Arabian  tribes,  as 
though  a  Divine  Presence  rested  on  its  solemn  heights. 
Around  each,  on  the  rocky  ledges  of  the  hill-side,  or 
in  the  retired  basins,  withdrawn  within  the  deep  re¬ 
cesses  of  the  adjoining  mountains,  or  beside  the  springs 
wThich  water  the  adjacent  valleys,  would  be  found 
pasture  of  herbage  or  of  aromatic  shrubs  for  the  flocks 
of  Jethro.  On  each,  in  that  early  age,  though  The  bum- 
now  found  only  on  Mount  Serbal,  must  have  mg  bush' 
grown  the  wild  acacia,  the  shaggy  thorn-bush  of  the 
Seneh ,  the  most  characteristic  tree  of  the  whole  range. 
So  natural,  so  thoroughly  in  accordance  with  the  scene, 
were  the  signs,  in  which  the  call  of  Moses  makes  itself 
heard  and  seen.  Not  in  any  outward  form,  human 
or  celestial,  such  as  the  priests  of  Heliopolis  were  wTont 
to  figure  to  themselves  as  the  representatives  of  Deity, 
but  out  of  the  midst  of  the  spreading  thorn,  the  out¬ 
growth  of  the  desert  wastes,  did  “  the  Lord  appear 
unto  Moses.”  A  flame  of  fire,  like  that  which  seemed 
to  consume  and  waste  away  His  people  in  the  furnace 
of  affliction,2  shone  forth  amidst  the  dry  branches  of 
the  thorny  tree,  and  “  behold !  the  bush,”  the  massive 
thicket,  “  burned  with  fire,  and  the  bush  was  not  con- 
“  sumed  ”  And  when  the  question  arose,  with  what  he 
should  work  the  signs  by  which  his  countrymen  shall 
believe  and  hearken  to  his  voice,  the  same  character  re¬ 
curs.  No  sword  of  war,  such  as  was  wielded  by  Egyp¬ 
tian  kings,  no  mystic  emblem,  such  as  was  borne  by 
Egyptian  gods,  but  —  ‘“What  is  that  in  thine  hand?’ 

1  Ant.  ii.  12,  §  1.  Compare  Sinai  and  Palestine ,  17,  20, 

2  See  Philo,  Vita  Mosis,  i.  91.  45,  46. 

16 


122 


THE  EXODUS. 


Lect.  V. 


“  And  he  said,  *  A  rod/  ” 1  —  a  staff,  a  shepherd’s  crook, 

The  shep-  the  staff  which  indicated  his  return  to  the  pas- 
herd’s  staff.  ^oraj  habits  of  his  fathers,  the  staff  on  which 

he  leaned  amidst  his  desert  wanderings,  the  staff  with 
which  he  guided  his  kinsman’s  flocks,  the  staff  like 
that  still  borne  by  Arab  chiefs,  —  this  was  to  be  the 
humble  instrument  of  divine  power.  “  In  this,”  as 
afterwards  in  the  yet  humbler  symbol  of  the  Cross, 
—  in  this,  the  symbol  of  his  simplicity,  of  his  exile, 
of  his  lowliness,  —  “the  world  was  to  be  conquered.” 
These  were  the  outward  signs  of  his  call.  And, 
whatever  the  explanation  put  on  their  precise  im¬ 
port,  there  is  this  undoubted  instruction  conveyed  in 
their  description,  that  they  are  marked  by  the  pecul¬ 
iar  appropriateness  and  homogeneousness  to  the  pe¬ 
culiar  circumstances  of  the  Prophet,  which  marks  all 
like  manifestations,  through  every  variety  of  form,  to 
the  Prophets,  the  successors  of  Moses,  in  each  suc¬ 
ceeding  age.  In  grace,  as  in  nature,  God,  if  we  may 
use  the  well-known  expression,  abhorret  saltum ,  abhors  a 
sudden,  unprepared  transition.  “  The  child  is  father  of 
“  the  man :  ”  the  man  is  father  of  the  prophet  —  the  days 
of  both  are  “bound  each  to  each  by  natural  piety.” 
It  is  the  first  signal  instance  of  the  prophetic  revela¬ 
tions.  Its  peculiar  form  is  the  key  of  all  that  follow. 

But,  as  in  all  these  Revelations,  it  is  the  substance 

The  Name  an(l  spirit  of  the  message,  rather  than  its 
of  Jehovah.  ou^war(5  form,  which  carries  with  it  the  most 

enduring  lesson,  and  the  surest  mark  of  its  heavenly 
origin.  “  Behold,  when  I  shall  come  to  the  children 
“  of  Israel,  and  shall  say  unto  them,  The  God  of  your 
“fathers  hath  sent  me  unto  you,  and  they  shall  say, 

1  In  the  Mussulman  traditions  it  that  worked  the  wonders.  D’Herbe- 
was  the  white  shining  hand  of  Moses  lot  (“  Moussa”). 


Lect.  V. 


THE  NAME  OF  JEHOVAH. 


123 


“  ‘  What  is  His  name  ?  ’  what  shall  I  say  unto  them  ? 
“And  God  said  unto  Moses,  I  am  that  I  am.  .  .  . 
“  Thus  shalt  thou  say  unto  the  children  of  Israel ,  c  I  AM 
“  hath  sent  me  unto  you ” 

It  has  been  observed,  that  the  great  epochs  of  the 
history  of  the  Chosen  People  are  marked  by  the  sev¬ 
eral  names,  by  which  in  each  the  Divine  Nature  is 
indicated.  In  the  Patriarchal  age  we  have  already 
seen  that  the  oldest  Hebrew  form  by  which  the  most 
general  idea  of  Divinity  is  expressed  is  “  El-Elohim,” 
“  The  Strong  One,”  “  The  Strong  Ones,”  “  The  Strong  ” 
“  Beth-El,”  “  Peni-El,”  remained  even  to  the  latest  times 
memorials  of  this  primitive  mode  of  address  and  wor¬ 
ship.  But  now  a  new  name,  and  with  it  a  new  truth, 
was  introduced.  “I  am  Jehovah;  I  appeared  unto 
“  Abraham,  Isaac,  and  Jacob,  by  the  name  of  El-Shad- 
“  dai  (God  Almighty) ;  but  by  my  name  JEHOVAH 
“  was  I  not  known  unto  them.” 1  The  only  certain 
use  of  it  before  the  time  of  Moses  is  in  the  name 2  of 
“  Jochebed,”  borne  by  his  own  mother.  It  has  been 
beautifully  conjectured3  that  in  the  small  circle  of 
that  family  a  dim  conception  had  thus  arisen  of  the 
Divine  Truth,  which  was  through  the  son  of  that 
family  proclaimed  forever  to  the  world.  It  was  the 
rending  asunder  of  the  veil  which  overhung  the 
temple 4  of  the  Egyptian  Sais.  “  I  am  that  which  has 
“  been,  and  which  is,  and  which  is  to  be ;  and  my  veil 
“  no  mortal  hath  yet  drawn  aside.”  It  was  the  decla¬ 
ration  of  the  simplicity,  the  unity,  the  self-existence 
of  the  Divine  Nature,5  the  exact  opposite  to  all  the 

1  Ex.  vi.  2,  3.  4  Plutarch,  De  Isid.  et  Os.  c.  9. 

2  Ibid.  20.  Jochebed  is  a  con-  5  The  word  Lord,  by  which  we 

traction  of  Jeho-chebed  =  “  Jehovah  render  it,  is  the  translation  of  icvpiog , 
my  glory.”  (Gesenius,  sub  voce.)  in  the  LXX.,  which  again  is  the 

3  Ewald,  ii.  204,  5.  translation  of  Adonai,  the  word  used 


124 


THE  EXODUS. 


Lect.  V. 


multiplied  forms  of  idolatry,  human,  animal,  and  celes¬ 
tial,  that  prevailed,  as  far  as  we  know,  everywhere 
else.  “  The  Eternal.”  This  was  the  moving  spring  of 
the  whole  life  of  Moses,  of  the  whole  story  of  the 
Exodus.  In  viewing  the  history,  even  as  a  mere  na¬ 
tional  record,  we  cannot,  if  we  would,  dispense  with 
the  impulse,  the  elevation,  of  which  the  name  of 
“Jehovah”  was  at  once  the  cause  and  the  symbol. 
Slowly  and  with  difficulty  it  won  its  way  into  the 
heart  of  the  people.  We  can  trace  it,  through  its 
gradual  incorporation,  into  the  proper  names  begin¬ 
ning  with  the  transformation  of  Hoshea  into  Jehoshua. 
We  can  trace  its  deep  religious  significance  in  the 
frequent  usage  which  separates  those  portions  of  the 
Sacred  records  where  the  name  “Jehovah”  occurs 
from  those  where  the  older  name  of  “  Elohim  ”  occurs. 
The  awe  which  it  inspired  went  on,  as  it  would  seem, 
increasing  rather  than  diminishing  with  the  lapse  of 
years.  A  new  turn  was  given  to  it  under  the  mon¬ 
archy,  when  it  becomes  encompassed  with  the  attri¬ 
butes  of  the  leader  of  the  armies  of  earth  and  heaven, 
“  Jehovah  Sabaoth,”  “  The  Lord  of  Hosts.”  And  in 
later  times  it  lies  concealed,  enshrined,  behind  the 
word  which  the  trembling  reverence  of  the  last  age 
of  the  Jewish  people  substituted  for  it,  and  which  ap¬ 
pears  in  the  Greek  and  in  the  English  version  of  the 
Scriptures,  —  “  Adonai,”  “  Kurios,”  “  the  Lord,”  —  a  sub¬ 
stitution  which,  whilst  it  effaced  the  historical  meaning 
of  the  name,  prepared  the  way  for  the  still  nearer 
and  closer  revelation  of  God  in  Him  whom  we  now 
emphatically  acknowledge  as  “  Our  Lord  ” 

by  the  excessive  reverence  of  the  Jehovah  is  the  French  “  L’Eternel,” 
later  Jews  in  the  place  of  Jehovah,  whence  Bunsen  has  taken,  in  his 
The  only  modern  translation  which  Bibelwerk ,  “  der  Ewige.” 
has  preserved  the  true  rendering  of 


Lix’T.  Y. 


THE  RETURN  OF  MOSES. 


125 


But  we  must  return  to  the  original  circumstances 
under  wdiich  the  Revelation  was  first  made.  The  return 
It  is  characteristic  of  the  Biblical  history  that of  Moses' 
this  new  name,  though  itself  penetrating  into  the 
most  abstract  metaphysical  idea  of  God,  yet  in  its 
effect  was  the  very  opposite  of  a  mere  abstraction. 
Moses  is  a  Prophet,  —  the  first  of  the  Prophets,  —  but 
he  is  also  a  Deliverer.  Israel,  indeed,  through  him 
becomes  “  a  chosen  people,”  “  a  holy  congregation,” — 
in  one  word,  a  Church.  But  it  also  through  him  be- 
becomes  a  nation :  it  passes,  by  his  means,  from  a  pas¬ 
toral,  subject,  servile  tribe,  into  a  civilized,  free,  inde¬ 
pendent  commonwealth.  It  is  in  this  aspect  that  the 
more  human  and  historical  side  of  his  appearance  pre¬ 
sents  itself.  It  is  true  that  even  here  we  see  him  very 
imperfectly.  In  him,  as  in  the  Apostles  afterwards, 
the  man  is  swallowed  up  in  the  cause,  the  messenger 
in  the  message  and  mission  with  which  he  is  charged. 
Yet  from  time  to  time,  and  here  in  this  opening  of 
his  career  more  than  elsewhere,  his  outward  and 
domestic  relations  are  brought  before  us.  He  returns 
to  Egypt  from  his  exile.  In  the  advice  of  his  father- 
in-law  to  make  war  upon  Egypt,1  in  his  meeting  with 
his  brother  in  the  desert  of  Sinai,  may  be  indications 
of  a  mutual  understanding  and  general  rising  of  the 
Arabian  tribes  against  the  Egyptian  monarchy.2  But 
in  the  Sacred  narrative  our  attention  is  fixed  only 
on  the  personal  relations  of  the  two  brothers,  now 
first  mentioned  together,  never  henceforth  to  His  per- 

°  y  sonal  ap- 

be  parted.  From  that  meeting  and  coopera-  pearance 
tion  we  have  the  first  indications  of  his  indi-  character, 
vidual  character  and  appearance.  We  are  accustomed 
to  invest  him  with  all  the  external  grandeur  which 

1  Artapanus.  2  Ewald,  ii.  59,  60. 


126 


THE  EXODUS. 


Lect.  V. 


would  naturally  correspond  to  the  greatness  of  his 
mission.  The  statue  of  Michael  Angelo  rises  before 
us  in  its  commanding  sternness,  as  the  figure  before 
which  Pharaoh  trembled.  Something,  indeed,  of  this 
is  justified  by  the  traditions  respecting  him.  The 
long  shaggy  hair  and  beard,1  which  infold  in  their  vast 
tresses  that  wild  form,  appear  in  the  heathen  repre¬ 
sentations  of  him.  The  beauty  of  the  child  is,  by  the 
same  traditions,  continued  into  his  manhood.  “  He 
“was,”  says  the  historian  Justin2  (with  the  confusion 
so  common  in  Gentile  representations),  “  both  as  wise 
“  and  as  beautiful  as  his  father  Joseph.”  But  the  only 
point  described  in  the  Sacred  narrative  is  one  of  sin¬ 
gular  and  unlooked-for  infirmity.  “  0  my  Lord,  I  am 
“  not  eloquent,  neither  heretofore,  nor  since  thou  hast 
“  spoken  to  thy  servant ;  but  I  am  slow  of  speech, 
“  and  of  a  slow  tongue ;  .  .  .  how  shall  Pharaoh  hear 
“  me,  which  am  of  uncircumcised  lips  ?  ”  —  that  is,  slow 
and  without  words,  “stammering  and  hesitating”  (so 
the  Septuagint  strongly  expresses  it),  like  Demos¬ 
thenes  in  his  earlier  youth,  —  slow  and  without  words, 
like  the  circuitous  orations  of  the  English  Cromwell,3 
—  “  his  speech  contemptible,”  like  the  Apostle  Paul. 
How  often  had  this  been  repeated  in  the  history  of 
the  world,  —  how  truly  has  the  answer  been  repeated 
also  :  “  Who  hath  made  man’s  mouth  ?  .  .  .  Have  not 
“  I  the  Lord  ?  .  .  .  I  will  be  thy  mouth,  and  teach 
“  thee  what  thou  shalt  say.” 

And  when  the  remonstrance  went  up  from  the  true, 

9 

1  An  old  man,  with  a  long  beard,  hue,  tinged  with  gray,  as  given  by 
seated  on  an  ass,  was  the  idea  of  Artapanus. 

Moses,  as  given  by  Diodorus  (xxxiv.) ;  2  xxxvi.  2. 

or  tall  and  dignified  in  appearance,  3  See  Carlyle’s  Cromwell ,  ii.  219. 

and  long  streaming  hair  of  a  reddish 


Lect.  v. 


AARON. 


127 


disinterested  heart  of  Moses,  “  0  my  Lord,  send,  I 
“  pray  thee,  by  the  hand  of  him  whom  thou  Relations  of 
“  wilt  send  ”  (“  Make  any  one  thine  Apostle  so  Aaron. 

“  that  it  be  not  me  ”),  the  future  relation  of  the  two 
brothers  is  brought  to  light.  “  Is  not  Aaron  the 
“  Levite  thy  brother  ?  I  know  that  he  can  speak 
“  well.  And  also,  behold,  he  cometh  forth  to  meet 
“  thee,  and  when  he  seeth  thee  he  will  be  glad  in  his 
“  heart.  And  thou  shalt  speak  unto  him,  and  put 
“  words  in  his  mouth.  .  .  .  And  he  shall  be  thy 
“  spokesman  unto  the  people,  and  he  shall  be,  even 
“he  shall  be  to  thee  instead  of  a  mouth,  and  thou 
“  shalt  be  to  him  instead  of  God.”  In  all  outward  ap¬ 
pearance, —  as  the  Chief  of  the  tribe  of  Levi,  as  the 
head  of  the  family  of  Amram,  as  the  spokesman  and 
interpreter,  as  the  first  who  “  spake  to  the  people  and 
“  to  Pharaoh  all  the  words  which  the  Lord  had  spoken 
“  to  Moses,”  and  did  the  signs  in  the  sight  of  the 
people,  as  the  permanent  inheritor  of  the  sacred  staff 
or  rod,  the  emblem  of  rule  and  power,  —  Aaron,  not 
Moses,  must  have  been  the  representative  and  leader 
of  Israel.  But  Moses  was  the  inspiring,  informing  soul 
within  and  behind ;  and,  as  time  rolled  on,  as  the 
first  outward  impression  passed  away  and  the  deep 
abiding  recollection  of  the  whole  story  remained,  Aaron 
the  prince  and  priest  has  almost  disappeared  from  the 
view  of  history  •  and  Moses,  the  dumb,  backward,  dis¬ 
interested  Prophet,  continues  for  all  ages  the  foremost 
leader  of  the  Chosen  People,  the  witness  that  some¬ 
thing  more  is  needed  for  the  guidance  of  man  than 
high  hereditary  office  or  the  gift  of  fluent  speech, — 
a  rebuke  alike  to  an  age  that  puts  its  trust  in  priests 
and  nobles,  and  an  age  that  puts  its  trust  in  preach¬ 
ers  and  speakers. 


128 


THE  EXODUS. 


lect.  v, 


As  his  relations  with  Aaron  give  us  a  glimpse  into 
His  wife  his  personal  history,  so  his  advance  towards 
dren.  Egypt  gives  us  a  glimpse  into  his  domestic  his¬ 
tory.  His  wife,  whom  he  had  won  by  his  chivalrous 
attack  on  the  Bedouin  shepherds  by  “the  well”  of 
Midi  an,  and  her  two  infant  sons,  are  with  him.  She 
is  seated  with  them  on  the  ass,  —  the  usual  mode  of 
travelling,  for  Israelites  at  least,  in  those  parts.  He 
walks  by  their  side  with  his  shepherd’s  staff  On 
the  journey  a  mysterious  and  almost  inexplicable  in¬ 
cident  occurs  in  the  family.  The  most  probable  ex¬ 
planation  seems  to  be,  that  at  the  caravansary  either 
Moses  or  his  eldest  child  was  struck  with  what  seemed 
to  be  a  mortal  illness.  In  some  way,  not  apparent  to 
us,  this  illness  was  connected  by  Zipporah  with  the 
fact  that  her  son  had  not  been  circumcised  —  whether 
in  the  general  neglect  of  that  rite  amongst  the  Israel¬ 
ites  in  Egypt,  or  in  consequence  of  his  birth  in  Midian. 
She  instantly  performed  the  rite,  and  threw  the  sharp 
instrument,  stained  with  the  fresh  blood,  at  the  feet 
of  her  husband,  exclaiming  in  the  agony  of  a  mother’s 
anxiety  for  the  life  of  her  child,  “A  bloody  husband 
“  thou  art  to  cause  the  death  of  my  son.”  Then,  when 
the  recovery  from  the  illness  took  place  (whether  of 
her  son  or  her  husband),  she  exclaims  again :  “  A 
“  bloody  husband  still  thou  art,  but  not  so  as  to  cause 
“  the  child’s  death,  but  only  to  bring  about  his  cir- 
“  cumcision.” 1 

It  would  seem  as  if  in  consequence  of  this  event, 

i  So  Ewald  ( Alterlh .  105),  and  for  “  marriage  ”  being  a  synonyme  for 
Bunsen  (Bibelwerk,  i.  112),  taking  the  “circumcision.”  It  is  possible  that 
sickness  to  have  visited  Moses.  Rosen-  on  this  story  is  founded  the  tradition 
miiller  makes  Gershom  the  victim  of  Artapanus  (Eusebius),  that  the 
(see  Ex.  iv.  25),  and  makes  Zipporah  Ethiopians  derived  circumcision  from 
address  Jehovah,  the  Arabic  word  Moses. 


Lect.  V. 


THE  DELIVERANCE. 


129 


whatever  it  was,  that  the  wife  and  her  children  were 
sent  back  to  Jethro,  and  remained  with  him  till 
Moses  joined  them  at  Kephidim!  Unless  Zipporah  is 
the  Cushite  wife1 2  who  gave  such  umbrage  to  Miriam 
and  Aaron,  we  hear  of  her  no  more. 

The  two  sons  also  sink  into  obscurity.  Their  names, 
though  of  Levitical  origin,  relate  to  their  foreign  birth¬ 
place.  Gershom,  the  u  stranger,”  and  Eli-ezer,  “  God  is 
my  help,”  commemorated  their  father’s  exile  and  es¬ 
cape.3  Their  posterity  lingered  in  obscurity  down  to 
the  time  of  David.4 

From  the  Deliverer  we  proceed  to  the  Deliverance. 
We  need  not  repeat  what  has  been  already  said  of 
the  condition  of  Egypt  at  this  time,  and  of  the  pecul¬ 
iar  oppression  of  the  Israelites. 

The  deliverance,  in  its  essential  features,  is  the  like¬ 
ness  of  all  such  deliverances.  “  When  the  tale  The  Delhr_ 

“  of  bricks  is  doubled  then  comes  Moses.”  erance‘ 
This  is  the  proverb  which  has  sustained  the  Jewish 
nation  through  many  a  long  oppression.  The  truth 
contained  in  it,  the  imagery  of  the  Exodus,  have 
doubtless  been  more  than  the  types,  they  have  often 
been  the  sustaining  causes  and  consolations,  of  the 
many  successful  struggles  which  from  that  day  to  this 
the  oppressed  have  waged  against  the  oppressor.  But 
that  which  is  peculiar  in  the  story  of  the  Exodus  is 
the  mode  by  which  it  was  effected.  First,  it  was  not 
a  mere  case  of  ordinary  insurrection  of  a  slave  popu¬ 
lation  against  their  masters.  The  Egyptian  version 
of  the  event  represents  it  as  a  dread,  an  aversion 

1  Ex.  xviii.  2-6.  3  Ex.  xviii.  3,  4. 

2  Num.  xii.  1.  Compare  the  juxta-  4  i  Chr.  xxiii.  16,  17;  xxiv.  24; 

position  of  “  Cushan  ”  and  “  Midian  ”  xxvi.  25-28.  See  also  Judg.  xviii. 

in  Ilab.  iii.  7.  30. 


17 


130 


THE  EXODUS. 


Lect.  V. 


entertained  by  the  oppressors  towards  the  oppressed 
as  towards  an  accursed  and  polluted  people.  It  was 
a  mutual  hatred.  The  king,  according1  to  the  con¬ 
stant  Egyptian  tradition,  was  troubled  by  dreams,  and 
commanded  by  oracles  to  rid  himself  of  the  nation 
of  lepers.  And  this,  from  another  point  of  view,  is 
also  the  prevailing  sentiment  of  the  Egyptians,  as 
given  in  the  Sacred  writers.  “  Rise  up,  and  get  you 
“  forth  from  among  my  people.  .  .  .  Egypt  was 
“  glad  at  their  departing  —  for  they  were  afraid  of 
“  them.” 

And  it  is  impossible,  as  we  read  the  description  of 
The  the  Plagues,  not  to  feel  how  much  of  force 
Plagues.  *s  a(jdeci  |0  it  py  a  knowledge  of  the  peculiar 
customs  and  character  of  the  country  in  which  they 
occurred.  It  is  not  an  ordinary  river  that  is  turned 
into  blood;  it  is  the  sacred,2  beneficent,  solitary  Nile, 
the  very  life  of  the  state  and  of  the  people,  in  its 
streams  and  canals  and  tanks,  and  vessels  of  wood 
and  vessels  of  stone,  then,  as  now,  used  for  the  filtra¬ 
tion  of  the  delicious  water  from  the  sediment  of  the 
river-bed.  It  is  not  an  ordinary  nation  that  is  struck 
by  the  mass  of  putrefying  vermin  lying  in  heaps  by 
the  houses,  the  villages,  and  the  fields,  or  multiplying 
out  of  the  dust  of  the  desert  sands  on  each  side  of 
the  Nile  valley.  It  is  the  cleanliest  of  all  the  ancient 
nations,  clothed  in  white  linen,  anticipating,  in  their 
fastidious  delicacy  and  ceremonial  purity,  the  habits 
of  modern  and  northern  Europe.  It  is  not  the  ordi¬ 
nary  cattle  that  died  in  the  field,  or  ordinary  fish  that 
died  in  the  river,  or  ordinary  reptiles  that  were  over¬ 
come  by  the  rod  of  Aaron.  It  is  the  sacred  goat  of 
Mendes,  the  ram  of  Ammon,  the  calf  of  Heliopolis, 


1  Jos.  c.  Apion ,  i.  26,  32,  34. 


2  Philo,  V.  M.  i.  17. 


lect.  y. 


THE  DELIVERANCE. 


131 


the  bull  Apis,  the  crocodile1  of  Ombos,  the  carp  of 
Latopolis.  It  is  not  an  ordinary  land  of  which  the 
flax  and  the  barley,  and  every  green  thing  in  the 
trees,  and  every  herb  of  the  field  are  smitten  by  the 
two  great  calamities  of  storm  and  locust.  It  is  the 
garden2  of  the  ancient  Eastern  world, — the  long  line 
of  green  meadow  and  cornfield,  and  groves  of  palm 
and  sycamore  and  fig-tree,  from  the  Cataracts  to  the 
Delta,  doubly  refreshing  from  the  desert  which  it  in¬ 
tersects,  doubly  marvellous  from  the  river  whence  it 
springs.  If  these  things  were  calamities  anywhere, 
they  were  truly  “  signs  and  wonders  ”  —  speaking  signs 
and  oracular  wonders  —  in  such  a  land  as  “the  land 
of  Ham.”  In  whatever  way  we  unite  the  Hebrew 
and  the  Egyptian  accounts,  there  can  be  no  doubt 
that  the  Exodus  was  a  crisis  in  Egyptian  as  well  as 
in  Hebrew  history,  “  a  nail  struck  into  the  coffin  of 
“  the  Egyptian  monarchy.” 3 

But,  secondly,  the  Israelite  annals,  unlike  the  rec¬ 
ords  of  any  other  nation,  in  ancient  or  modern  times, 
which  has  thrown  off  the  yoke  of  slavery,  claim  no 
merit,  no  victory  of  their  own.  There  is  no  Marathon, 
no  Regillus,  no  Tours,  no  Morgarten.  All  is  from 
above,  nothing  from  themselves.4  In  whatever  propor¬ 
tions  the  natural  and  the  supernatural  are  intermin¬ 
gled,  this  result  equally  remains.  The  locusts,  the 
flies,  the  murrain,  the  discolored  river,  the  storm,  the 
darkness  of  the  sandy  wind,  the  plague,  are  calamities 
natural5  to  Egypt,  though  rare,  and  exhibited  here  in 

1  The  “serpent”  of  Exod.  vii.  9,  3  Bunsen,  Bibelurkunden,  i.  107. 

10,  12  (a  different  word  from  that  in  4  See  the  version  of  the  plagues 

iv.  3;  vii.  15),  is  evidently  a  “  croco-  given  by  Artapanus  (Eusebius), 
dile.”  5  This  is  the  view  taken  in  Hengst- 

2  Gen.  xiii.  10 ;  “a  garden  of  the  enberg’s  Egypt  and  the  Books  of 

“  Lord,  the  land  of  Egypt.”  Moses. 


132 


THE  EXODUS. 


Lect.  V. 


The 

Exodus. 


aggravated  and  terrible  forms.  But  not  the  less  are 
they  the  interventions  of  a  Power  above  the  power 
of  man,  —  not  the  less  did  they  call  the  mind  of  the 
Israelite  from  dwelling  on  his  own  strength  and  glory, 
to  the  mighty  Hand  and  the  stretched-out  Arm,  on 
which  alone,  through  his  subsequent  history,  he  was 
to  lean.  It  is  in  the  final  issue  of  the  Exodus  that 
this  most  clearly  appears,  and  here  we  can  approach 
more  nearly  to  the  events  as  they  actually  presented 
themselves ;  especially  with  the  additional  light  thrown 
upon  it  by  the  allusions  in  the  Psalms,  by  the  parallel 
story  of  Josephus,  and  by  the  customs  through  which 
it  was  commemorated  in  after-times. 

There  are  some  days  of  which  the  traces  left  on 
the  mind  of  a  nation  are  so  deep  that  the 
events  themselves  seem  to  live  on  long  after 
they  have  been  numbered  with  the  past.  Such  was 
the  night  of  the  month  Nisan  in  the  eighteenth  cen¬ 
tury  before  the  Christian  era.  “It  is  a  night  to  be 
“much  observed  unto  the  Lord,  for  bringing  them 
“  out  of  the  land  of  Egypt ;  this  is  that  night  of  the 
“  Lord  to  be  observed  of  the  children  of  Israel  in 
“  their  generations.”  Dimly  we  see  and  hear,  in  the 
darkness  and  the  confusion  of  that  night,  the  stroke 
which  at  last  broke  the  heart  of  the  king  and  made 
him  let  Israel  go.  “At  midnight  the  Lord  smote  all 
“the  first-born  in  the  land  of  Egypt,  from  the  firsir 
“  born  of  Pharaoh  that  sat  on  his  throne,  to  the  first- 
“  born  of  the  captive  that  was  in  the  dungeon ;  and 
“  all  the  first-born  of  cattle.  And  Pharaoh  rose  up  in 
“  the  night,  he,  and  all  his  servants,  and  all  the  Egyp- 
“  tians ;  and  there  was  a  great  cry  in  Egypt,”  —  the 
loud,  frantic,  funeral  wail  characteristic  of  the  whole 
nation,  —  “  for  there  was  not  a  house  where  there  was 


Lect.  V. 


THE  PASSOVER. 


133 


“not  one  dead.”  In  the  Egyptian  accounts  this  de¬ 
struction  was  described1  as  effected  by  an  incursion 
of  the  Arabs.  The  Jewish  Psalmist  ascribes  it  to  the 
sudden  visitation  of  the  plague.  “  He  spared  not  their 
“  soul  from  death,  but  gave  their  life  over  unto  the 
“  pestilence.” 2  Egyptian  and  Israelite  each  regarded 
it  as  a  divine  judgment  on  the  worship,  no  less  than 
the  power,  of  Egypt.  “The  Egyptians  buried  their 
“  first-born  whom  the  Lord  had  smitten ;  upon  their 
“  gods  also  did  the  Lord  execute  judgment.” 3 

But  whilst  of  the  more  detailed  effect  of  that  night 
on  Egypt  we  know  nothing,  for  its  effects  on  Israel 
it  might  almost  be  said  that  we  need  not  go  back  to 
any  written  narrative.  It  still  moves  and  breathes 
amongst  us. 

Amongst  the  various  festivals  of  the  Jewish  Church, 
one  only  (till  the  institution  of  those  which  The  Pass. 
commemorated  the  much  later  deliverances over- 
from  Haman  and  from  Antiochus  Epiphanes)  was  dis¬ 
tinctly  historical.  In  the  feast  of  the  Pesach,  Pascha, 
or  Passover,  the  scene  of  the  flight  of  the  Israelites, 
its  darkness,  its  hurry,  its  confusion,  was  acted  year 
by  year,  as  in  a  living  drama.  In  part  it  is  still  so 
acted  throughout  the  Jewish  race;  in  all  its  essential 
features  (some  of  which  have  died  out  everywhere  else) 
it  is  enacted,  in  the  most  lively  form,  by  the  solitary 
remnant  of  that  race  which,  under  the  name  of  Sa¬ 
maritan,  celebrates  the  whole  Paschal  sacrifice,  year 
by  year,  on  the  summit  of  Mount  Gerizim.4  Each 
householder  assembled  his  family  round  him ;  the  feast 
was  within  the  house;  there  was  no  time  or  place 


1  Jos.  c.  Apion ,  i.  27. 

2  Psalm  lxxviii.  51. 

3  Num.  xxxiii.  4. 


4  From  this  ceremony,  described 
to  me  by  an  eye-witness,  most  of  the 
following  account  is  taken. 


134 


THE  EXODUS. 


Lect.  V. 


for  priest  or  sacred  edifice,  —  even  after  the  establish 
ment  of  the  sanctuary  at  Jerusalem  this  vestige  of 
the  primitive  or  the  irregular  celebration  of  that  night 
continued,  and  not  in  the  Temple  courts,  hut  in  the 
upper  chamber1  of  the  private  houses,  was  the  room 
prepared  where  the  Passover  was  to  be  eaten.  The 
animal  slain  and  eaten  on  the  occasion  was  itself  a 
memorial  of  the  pastoral  state  of  the  people.  The 
shepherds  of  Goshen,  with  their  flocks  and  herds, 
whatever  else  they  could  furnish  for  a  hasty  meal, 
would  at  least  have  a  lamb  or  a  kid,  —  “  a  male  of 
“  the  .first  year  from  the  sheep  or  from  the  goats.” 
They  struck  its  blood  on  the  door-posts  of  the  house 
as  a  sign  of  their  deliverance.  At  Gerizim  the  Samar¬ 
itan  community  rushes  forward,  and,  as  the  blood  flows 
from  the  throat  of  the  slaughtered  lamb,  they  dip 
their  fingers  in  the  stream;  and  each  man,  woman, 
and  child,  even  to  the  child  in  arms,  is  marked  on 
the  forehead  with  the  red  stain.  On  the  cruciform 
wooden  spit  —  this  we  know  from  Justin2  Martyr  was 
the  practice  in  ancient  times,  and  the  Christian  spec¬ 
tator  on  Gerizim  starts  as  he  sees  it  at  this  day  — 
on  the  cruciform  spit  the  lamb  is  left,  after  the  manner 
of  Eastern  feasts,  to  he  roasted  whole  during  the  re¬ 
maining  hours  of  the  day. 

Night  falls ;  the  stars  come  out ;  the  bright  moon 
is  in  the  sky :  the  household  gathers  round ;  and  then 
takes  place  the  hasty  meal,  of  which  every  part  is 
marked  by  the  almost  frantic  haste  of  the  first  cele¬ 
bration,  when  Pharaoh’s  messengers  were  expected 
every  instant  to  break  in  with  the  command,  “  Get 
“  you  forth  from  among  my  people  ;  Go  !  Begone !  ” 

1  Mark  xiv.  15,  sqq. 

2  Dial.  c.  Tryphone ;  Bochart,  Hieroz.  “  de  Agno  Pascliali.” 


Lect.  V. 


THE  PASSOVER. 


135 


The  guests  of  each  household  at  the  moment  of  the 
meal  rose  from  their  sitting  and  recumbent  posture, 
and  stood  round  the  table  on  their  feet.  Their  feet, 
usually  bare  within  the  house,  were  shod  as  if  for  a 
journey.  Each  member  of  the  household,  even  the 
women,  had  staffs  in  their  hands,  as  if  for  an  imme¬ 
diate  departure ;  the  long  Eastern  garments  of  the 
men  were  girt  up,  for  the  same  reason,  round  their 
loins.  The  roasted  lamb  was  torn  to  pieces,  each 
snatching  and  grasping  in  his  eager  fingers  the  mor¬ 
sel  which  he  might  not  else  have  time  to  eat.  Not 
a  fragment  is  left  for  the  morning,  which  will  find 
them  gone  and  far  away.  The  cakes  of  bread  which 
they  broke  and  ate  were  tasteless  from  the  want  of 
leaven,  which  there  had  been  no  leisure  to  prepare ; 
and,  as  on  that  fatal  midnight  they  “  took  their  dough 
“  before  it  was  leavened,  their  kneading  troughs  being 
“  bound  up  in  their  clothes  on  their  shoulders,”  so  the 
recollection  of  this  characteristic  incident  was  stamped 
into  the  national  memory  by  the  prohibition  of  every 
kind  of  leaven  or  ferment,  for  seven  whole  days  dur¬ 
ing  the  celebration  of  the  feast  —  the  feast,  as  it  was 
from  this  cause  named,  of  unleavened  bread.  And, 
finally,  in  the  subsequent  union  of  later  and  earlier 
usages,  the  thanksgiving  for  their  deliverance  was 
always  present.  The  reminiscence  of  their  bondage 
was  kept  up  by  the  mess  of  bitter  herbs,  which  gave 
a  relish  to  the  supper ;  and  that  bitter  cup  again  was 
sweetened  by  the  festive  character  which  ran  through 
the  whole  transaction,  and  gave  it  in  later  genera¬ 
tions  what  in  its  first  institution  it  could  hardly  have 
had,  —  its  full  social  and  ecclesiastical  aspect ;  the  wine- 
cups  of  blessing,  and  the  long-sustained  hymn  from 
the  113th  to  the  118th  Psalm,  of  which  the  thrilling 


136 


THE  EXODUS. 


lect.  v. 


parts  must  always  have  been  those  which  sing  how 
“  Israel  came  out  of  Egypt ;  ” 1  how  u  not  unto  them, 
“not  unto  them,  but  unto  Jehovah’s  name  was  the 
“  praise  to  be  given  for  ever  and  ever.” 2 

So  lived  on  for  centuries  the  tradition  of  the  De¬ 
liverance  from  Egypt ;  and  so  it  lives  on  still,  chiefly 
in  the  Hebrew  race,  but,  in  part,  in  the  Christian 
Church  also.  Alone  of  all  the  Jewish  festivals,  the 
Passover  has  outlasted  the  Jewish  polity,  has  over¬ 
leaped  the  boundary  between  the  Jewish  and  Chris¬ 
tian  communities.  With  the  other  festivals  of  the 
Israelites  we  have  no  concern :  even  the  name  of  the 
weekly  festival  of  the  Sabbath  only  continues  amongst 
us  by  a  kind  of  recognized  solecism,  and  its  day  has 
been  studiously  changed.  But  the  name  of  the  Pas¬ 
chal  feast  in  the  largest  proportion  of  Christendom  is 
still,  unaltered,  the  name  of  the  greatest  Christian 
holiday.  The  Paschal  Lamb,  in  deed  or  in  word,  is 
become  to  us  symbolical  of  the  most  sacred  of  all 
events.  The  Easter  full  moon,  which  has  so  long 
regulated  the  calendars  of  the  Christian  world,  is,  one 
may  say,  the  lineal  successor  of  the  bright  moonlight 
which  shed  its  rays  over  the  palm-groves  of  Egypt  on 
the  fifteenth  night  of  the  month  Nisan  ;  Jew  and  Chris¬ 
tian,  at  that  season,  both  celebrate  what  is  to  a  cer¬ 
tain  extent  a  common  festival;  even  the  most  sacred 
ordinance  of  the  Christian  religion  is,  in  its  outward 
form,  a  relic  of  the  Paschal  Supper,  accompanied  by 
hymn  and  thanksgiving,  in  the  upper  chamber  of  a 
Jewish  household.  The  nature  of  the  bread  which  is 
administered  in  one  large  section  of  the  Christian 
Church  bears  witness,  by  its  round  unleavened  wafers, 
to  its  Jewish  origin,  and  to  the  disorder  of  the  hour 


1  Ps.  cxiv.  1. 


2  Ps.  cxv.  1. 


Lect.  V. 


THE  FLIGHT. 


137 


when  it  was  first  eaten.  And  as,  in  the  course 
of  history,  ecclesiastical  as  well  as  civil,  events  the 
most  remote  and  the  most  trivial  constantly  ramify 
into  strange  and  unlooked-for  consequences,  —  the 
attempt  of  the  Latin  Church  to  perpetuate,  and  of 
the  Eastern  Church  to  cast  off,  this  historical  con¬ 
nection  with  the  peculiar  usage  of  the  ancient  people 
from  which  they  both  sprang,  became  one  of  the 
chief  causes  or  pretexts  of  their  final  rupture  from 
each  other. 

It  is  difficult  to  conceive  the  migration  of  a  wdiole 
nation  under  such  circumstances.  This  diffi-  The  Flight, 
culty,  amongst  others,  has  induced  the  well-known 
French  commentator 1  on  the  Exodus,  with  every 
desire  of  maintaining  the  letter  of  the  narrative,  to 
reduce  the  numbers  of  the  text  from  600,000  to  600 
armed  men.  The  great  German  scholar  defends  the 
correctness  of  the  original  numbers.2  In  illustration 
of  the  event,  a  sudden  retreat  is  recorded  of  a  whole 
nomadic  people,  —  400,000  Tartars,  —  under  cover  of  a 
single  night,  from  the  confines  of  Russia  into  their 
native  deserts,  as  late  as  the  close  of  the  last  century.3 
We  may  leave  the  question  to  the  critical  analysis  of 
the  text  and  of  the  probabilities  of  the  case,  and  con¬ 
fine  ourselves  to  what  remains  equally  true  under 
either  hypothesis.  Those  who  have  seen  the  start  of 
the  great  caravans  of  pilgrims  in  the  East  may  form 
some  notion  of  the  silence  and  order  with  which  even 
very  large  masses  break  up  from  their  encampments, 
and,  as  in  this  instance,  usually  in  the  darkness  and 
the  cool  of  the  night,  set  out  on  their  journey,  the 
torches  flaring  before  them,  the  train  of  camels  and 

1  Laborde  on  Exodus  and  Numbers.  3  See  Bell’s  History  of  Russia ,  ii. 

2  Ewald,  ii.  253,  sqq.  App.  C. 


18 


138 


THE  EXODUS. 


lect.  v. 


asses  spreading  far  and  wide  through  the  broad  level 
desert. 

From  Eameses  the  first  start  was  made.  This  the 
Rameses,  Septuagint  fixed  on  the  north-east  skirts  of 
the  Delta,  and  to  the  same  locality  we  are  directed 
by  the  most  recent  discoveries.  All  that  follows  is 
wrapt  in  too  great  an  obscurity  to  justify  any  de¬ 
tailed  description.  The  spots  are  indeed  named  with 
an  exactness  which  provokes  and  tantalizes  in  propor¬ 
tion  to  the  certainty  with  which  they  must  once  have 
been  known,  and  the  uncertainty  which  has  rested 
upon  them  since.  Still  the  general  direction  of  the 
flight,  and  the  general  features  of  the  resting-places 
may  be  gathered.  Southeastward  they  went,  —  not 
by  the  short  and  direct  road  to  Palestine,  but  by  the 
same  circuitous  route,  through  the  wilderness  of  the 
Red  Sea,  which  their  ancestors  had  followed  in  bear¬ 
ing  away  the  body  of  Jacob,  as  now  they  were  bear¬ 
ing  off,  with  different  thoughts  and  aims,  the  coffin 
which  contained  the  embalmed  remains  of  Joseph. 
The  nomenclature  of  the  several  halts  indicates  some¬ 
thing  of  the  country  through  which  they  passed.  The 
Succoth,  first  was  “  Succoth,”  —  the  place  of  “  booths  ” 
or  “  leafy  hats”  —  the  last  spot  where  they  could  have 
found  the  luxuriant  foliage  of  tamarisk  and  sycamore 
and  palm,  “  branches  of  thick  trees  to  make  booths, 
“  as  it  is  written.”  How  deeply  that  first  resting-place 
was  intended  to  be  sunk  into  their  remembrance  may 
be  gathered  from  the  fact,  that  this,  rather  than  any 
of  the  numerous  halts  in  their  later  wanderings,  was 
selected  to  be  represented  after  their  entrance  into 
Feast  of  Palestine,  as  a  memorial  of  their  stay  in  the 

Taberna-  7  J 

cies,  wilderness.  The  Feast  of  Tabernacles,  or  Suc¬ 
coth,  was  a  feast  not  of  tents, —  but  of  huts  woven 


Lect.  V. 


PASSAGE  OF  THE  RED  SEA. 


139 


together  from  “the  boughs  of  goodly  trees,  branches 
“  of  palm-trees,  and  the  boughs  of  thick  trees,  and 
“willows  of  the  brook,”  that  “all  their  generations 
“might  know  that  the  Lord  made  the  children  of 
“  Israel  to  dwell  in  booths,  when  He  brought  them  up 
“out  of  the  land  of  Egypt.”1  It  was  the  first  step 
that  involved  the  whole;  it  was  the  first  step,  there¬ 
fore,  the  last  lingering  on  the  confines  of  Egyptian 
vegetation  and  civilization,  the  first  step  into  the  wan¬ 
dering  state  of  the  desert,  that  was  to  be  hence¬ 
forward  commemorated.  The  next  halt  was  Etham. 
Etham ,  on  “the  edge  of  the  wilderness.”  Cities  they 
had  left  behind  them  at  Eameses;  the  groves  and 
villages  they  had  left  behind  at  Succoth;  the  green 
land  of  Egypt,  cut  off  as  with  a  knife  from  the  hard 
desert  tract  on  which  they  now  entered,  they  left 
behind  at  Etham.  They  were  now  fairly  in  the  wil¬ 
derness. 

And  now  came  the  command  “  to  turn,”  not  to  go 
straight  forward,  as  they  would  have  expected,  round 
the  head  of  the  gulf,  hut  “  to  turn  ”  and  “  encamp  be- 
“  tween  Migdol  and  the  sea,  beside  the  sea,  before 
“  Pi-hahiroth,  over  against  Baal-zephon.”  Here  is  ex¬ 
actly  a  case  of  that  precision  which  guaran-  Passage 

J  11  n  1  of  the  Red 

tees  to  us  that  the  spot  was  once  well  known,  Sea. 
yet  which  now  serves  us  but  little.2  Could  we  but 
discover  the  site  of  the  pastures  of  Pi-hahiroth  (such 
must  be  the  meaning  of  that  Egyptian  word)  or  the 
sanctuary  of  Typhon  (such  must  be  the  meaning  of 
Baal-zephon),  the  controversy  respecting  the  locality 
and  the  nature  of  the  passage  of  the  Red  Sea  would 
be  at  an  end.  As  it  is,  we  are  led  in  two  opposite 
directions,  —  on  the  one  hand,  the  extreme  northern 

2  Sinai  and  Palestine ,  34-37. 


1  Lev.  xxiii.  40-43. 


140 


THE  EXODUS. 


Lect.  V. 


point  (beyond  the  spot  where  the  present  gulf  ter¬ 
minates,  but  to  which  it  must  anciently  have  extend¬ 
ed)  is  indicated  by  the  mention  of  Migdol,  which  can 
hardly  be  any  other  than  the  well-known  town  or 
tower  called  by  the  Greeks  Magdolon;  on  the  other 
hand,  the  narrative  of  Josephus  speaks  distinctly  of 
“  the  mountain  ”  as  that  which  66  entangled  and  shut 
“  them  in,”  which  can  be  no  other  than  the  lofty 
range  of  the  Jebel  Attaka,  the  Mountain  of  Deliver¬ 
ance,  south  of  the  modern  Suez.  But  whichever  of 
these  it  be,  the  narrative  compels  us  to  look  for  the 
passage  somewhere  near  the  head  of  the  then  gulf, 
whence  the  width  would  be  such  as  to  allow  the  host 
to  pass  over  in  a  single  night,  and  the  waters  to  be 
parted  by  the  means  described,  namely,  by  a  strong 
wind.1  The  ancient  theory  adopted  by  the  Rabbinical 
and  early  Christian  writers,  that  the  Israelites  merely 
performed  a  circuit  in  the  sea  and  returned  again  to 
the  Egyptian  shores,  will  now  be  maintained  by  no 
one  who  has  any  regard  to  the  dignity  of  the  story 
or  the  grandeur  of  the  event  described.  Dismissing, 
therefore,  these  geographical  considerations,  we  may 
fix  our  minds  on  the  essential  features  of  this  great 
deliverance,  as  it  will  be  acknowledged  without  dis¬ 
pute  by  every  reader. 

The  Israelites  were  encamped  on  the  western  shore 
of  the  Red  Sea,  when  suddenly  a  cry  of  alarm  ran 
through  the  vast  multitude.  Over  the  ridges2  of  the 
desert  hills  were  seen  the  well-known  horses,  the  ter¬ 
rible  chariots  of  the  Egyptian  host :  “  Pharaoh  pursued 
“  after  the  children  of  Israel,  and  they  were  sore 
“  afraid.” 

1  Not  necessarily  “  east.”  See  LXX.  2  Philo,  V.  M.  i.  30. 

(Ex.  xiv.  21),  and  Philo,  V.  Mi.  32. 


Lect.  y. 


PASSAGE  OF  THE  RED  SEA. 


141 


“  They  were  sore  afraid ;  ”  and  in  that  terror  and 
perplexity  the  sun  went  down  behind  the  huge  moun¬ 
tain-range  which  rose  on  their  rear,  and  cut  off  their 
return  to  Egypt;  and  the  dark  night1  fell  over  the 
waters  of  the  sea  which  rolled  before  them  and  cut 
off  their  advance  into  the  desert.  So  closed  in  upon 
them  that  evening ;  where  were  they  when  the  morn¬ 
ing  broke  over  the  hills  of  Arabia?  where  were  they, 
and  where  were  their  enemies  ? 

They  stood  in  safety  on  the  further  shore;  and 
the  chariots,  and  the  horsemen,  and  the  host  of  Pha* 
raoh  had  vanished  in  the  waters.  Let  us  calmly  con¬ 
sider,  so  far  as  our  knowledge  will  allow  us,  the  ex¬ 
tent  of  such  a  deliverance,  effected  at  a  moment  so 
critical. 

First,  we  must  observe  what  may  be  called  the 
whole  change  of  the  situation.  They  had  Passage 

from  A 

passed  in  that  night  from  Africa  to  Asia ;  to  Asia : 
they  had  crossed  one  of  the  great  boundaries  which 
divide  the  quarters  of  the  world;  a  thought  always 
thrilling,  how  much  more  when  we  reflect  on  what  a 
transition  it  involved  to  them.  Behind  the  African 
hills,  which  rose  beyond  the  Red  Sea,  lay  the  strange 
land  of  their  exile  and  bondage,  —  the  land  of  Egypt 
with  its  mighty  river,  its  immense  buildings,  its  mon¬ 
ster-worship,  its  grinding  tyranny,  its  overgrown  civ¬ 
ilization.  This  they  had  left  to  revisit  no  more:  the 
Red  Sea  flowed  between  them ;  u  the  Egyptians  whom 
“  they  saw  yesterday  they  will  now  see  no  more  again 
“  for  ever.”  And  before  them  stretched  the  level  plains 
of  the  Arabian  desert,  the  desert  where  their  fathers 
and  their  kindred  had  wandered  in  former  times, 


Being  the  18th  or  19th  of  the  month,  the  moon  would  not  rise  till  some 


hours  after  nightfall. 


142 


THE  EXODUS. 


Lect.  V. 


where  their  great  leader  had  fed  the  flocks  of  Jethro, 
through  which  they  must  advance  onwards  till  they 

from  slavery  reach  the  Land  of  Promise.  Further,  this 
to  freedom,  change  0f  local  situation  was  at  once  a  change 

of  moral  condition.  From  slaves  they  had  become 
free ;  from  an  oppressed  tribe  they  had  become  an 
independent  nation.  It  is  their  deliverance  from  sla¬ 
very.  It  is  the  earliest  recorded  instance  of  a  great 
national  emancipation.  In  later  times  Religion  has 
been  so  often  and  so  exclusively  associated  with  ideas 
of  order,  of  obedience,  of  submission  to  authority,  that 
it  is  well  to  he  occasionally  reminded  that  it  has  had 
other  aspects  also.  This,  the  first  epoch  of  our  relig¬ 
ious  history,  is,  in  its  original  historical  significance, 
the  sanctification,  the  glorification  of  national  inde¬ 
pendence  and  freedom.  Whatever  else  was  to  suc¬ 
ceed  to  it,  this  was  the  first  stage  of  the  progress  of 
the  Chosen  People.  And  when  in  the  Christian  Scrip¬ 
tures  and  in  the  Christian  Church  we  find  the  Pas¬ 
sage  of  the  Red  Sea  taken  as  the  likeness  of  the 
moral  deliverance  from  sin  and  death,  —  when  we 
read  in  the  Apocalypse  of  the  vision  of  those  who 
stand  victorious  on  the  shores  of  “the  glassy  sea 
“  mingled  with  fire,  having  the  harps  of  God  and 
“  singing  the  song  of  Moses  the  servant  of  God,  and 
“  the  song  of  the  Lamb,”  —  these  are  so  many  sacred 
testimonies  to  the  importance,  to  the  sanctity  of  free¬ 
dom,  to  the  wrong  and  the  misery  of  injustice,  op¬ 
pression,  and  tyranny.  The  word  “  Redemption,”  which 
has  now  a  sense  far  holier  and  higher,  first  entered 
into  the  circle  of  religious  ideas  at  the  time  when 
God  “  redeemed  His  people  from  the  house  of  bond- 
“  age.” 

But  it  was  not  only  the  fact  but  the  mode  of  their 


Lect.  V. 


PASSAGE  OF  THE  RED  SEA. 


143 


deliverance  which  made  this  event  so  remarkable  in 
itself;  in  its  applications;  and  in  its  lasting  con-  Its  myste- 

rious 

sequences.  We  must  place  it  before  us,  if  character, 
possible,  not  as  we  conceive  it  from  pictures  and  from 
our  own  imaginations,  but  as  in  the  words  of  the 
Sacred  narrative,  illustrated  by  the  Psalmist,  and  by 
the  commentary  of  Josephus  and  Philo.1  The  Passage, 
as  thus  described,  was  effected  not  in  the  calmness 
and  clearness  of  daylight,  but  in  the  depth  of  mid¬ 
night,  amidst  the  roar  of  the  hurricane  which  caused 
the  sea  to  go  back  —  amidst  a  darkness  lit  up  only 
by  the  broad  glare  of  the  lightning  as  66  the  Lord 
“  looked  out  ”  from  the  thick  darkness  of  the  cloud. 
“  The  waters  saw  Thee,  0  God,  the  waters  saw  Thee 
u  and  were  afraid  ;  the  depths  also  were  troubled.  The 
u  clouds  poured  out  w^ater ;  the  air  thundered ;  Thine 
“  arrows  went  abroad ;  the  voice  of  Thy  thunder  was 
“  heard  round  about ;  the  lightnings  shone  upon  the 
“  ground ;  the  earth  was  moved  and  shook  withal.” 2 
We  know  not,  they  knew  not,  by  what  precise  means 
the  deliverance  was  wrought :  we  know  not  by  what 
precise  track  through  the  gulf  the  passage  was  effected. 
We  know  not,  and  we  need  not  know ;  the  obscurity, 
the  mystery,  here  as  elsewhere,  was  part  of  the  les¬ 
son.  “  God’s  way  was  in  the  sea,  and  His  paths  in 
u  the  great  waters,  and  Ilis  footsteps  were  not  known!’ 
All  that  we  see  distinctly  is,  that  through  this  dark 
and  terrible  night,  with  the  enemy  pressing  close  be¬ 
hind,  and  the  driving  sea  on  either  side,  He  “led  His 
“  people  like  sheep  by  the  hand  of  Moses  and  Aaron.” 

Long  afterwards  was  the  recollection  preserved  in 

1  V.  M.  i.  32.  history  as  given  by  Josephus  (Ant.  ii. 

2  That  the  storm  of  rain,  thunder,  16,  §  3),  and  Philo  (V.  M.  i.  32), 
and  lightning  is  a  genuine  part  of  the  appears  from  Ps.  lxxvii.  12-21. 


144 


THE  EXODUS. 


Lect.  V, 


all  their  religious  imagery.  Living  as  they  did  apart 
from  all  maritime  pursuits,  yet  their  poetry,  their 
devotion,  abounds  with  expressions  which  can  be 
traced  back  only  to  this  beginning  of  their  national 
history.  They  had  been  literally  “  baptized  unto 
“  Moses  in  the  cloud  and  in  the  sea.”  And,  as  in  the 
case  of  the  early  Christians,  the  plunge  in  the  baptis¬ 
mal  bath  was  never  forgotten,  so  even  in  the  dry  in¬ 
land  valleys  of  Palestine,  danger  and  deliverance  were 
always  expressed  by  the  visions  of  sea  and  storm. 
“  All  Thy  waves  and  storms  are  gone  over  me.” 
“  The  springs  of  waters  were  seen,  and  the  foundations 
“  of  the  round  world  were  discovered  at  Thy  chiding, 
“  0  Lord,  at  the  blasting  of  the  breath  of  Thy  dis- 

“  pleasure . He  drew  me  out  of  many  waters.” 

Their  whole  national  existence  was  a  thanksgiving,  a 
votive  tablet,  for  their  deliverance  in  and  from  and 
through  the  Eed  Sea. 

But  another  and  a  still  more  abiding  impression 
its  provi-  was  that  this  deliverance  —  the  first  and  great- 
character.  est  in  their  history  —  was  effected,  not  by  their 
own  power,  but  by  the  power  of  God.  There  are 
moments  in  the  life  both  of  men  and  of  nations,  both 
of  the  world  and  of  the  Church,  when  vast  blessings 
are  gained,  vast  dangers  averted,  through  our  own 
exertions,  —  by  the  sword  of  the  conqueror,  by  the 
genius  of  the  statesman,  by  the  holiness  of  the  saint. 
Such,  in  Jewish  history,  was  the  conquest  of  Palestine 
by  Joshua,  the  deliverances  wrought  by  Gideon,  by 
Samson,  and  by  David.  Such,  in  Christian  history  ? 
were  the  revolutions  effected  by  Clovis,  by  Charle¬ 
magne,  by  Alfred,  by  Bernard,  and  by  Luther.  But 
there  are  moments  of  still  higher  interest,  of  still  more 
solemn  feeling,  when  deliverance  is  brought  about  not 


Lect.  V. 


THE  PASSAGE  OF  THE  RED  SEA. 


145 


by  any  human  energy,  but  by  causes  beyond  our  own 
control.  Such,  in  Christian  history,  are  the  raising 
of  the  siege  of  Leyden  and  the  overthrow  of  the 
Armada,  and  such,  above  all,  was  the  Passage  of  the 
Red  Sea. 

Whatever  were  the  means  employed  by  the  Al¬ 
mighty  —  whatever  the  path  which  He  made  for  Him¬ 
self  in  the  great  waters,  it  was  to  Him,  and  not  to 
themselves,  that  the  Israelites  were  compelled  to  look 
as  the  source  of  their  escape.  “Stand  still 1  and  see 
“  the  salvation  of  Jehovah,”  was  their  only  duty. 
“  Jehovah  hath  triumphed  gloriously,”  was  their  only 
song  of  victory.  It  was  a  victory  into  which  no  feel¬ 
ing  of  pride  or  self-exaltation  could  enter.  It  was  a 
fit  opening  of  a  history  and  of  a  character,  which  was 
to  be  specially  distinguished  from  that  of  other  races 
by  its  constant  and  direct  dependence  on  the  Supreme 
Judge  and  Ruler  of  the  world.  Greece  and  Rome 
could  look  back  with  triumph  to  the  glorious  days 
when  they  had  repulsed  their  invaders,  had  risen  on 
their  tyrants,  or  driven  out  their  kings.  But  the 
birthday  of  Israel, — the  birthday  of  the  religion,  of 
the  liberty,  of  the  nation,  of  Israel, —  was  the  Passage 
of  the  Red  Sea ;  —  the  likeness  in  this,  as  in  so  many 
other  respects,  of  the  yet  greater  events  in  the  begin¬ 
nings  of  the  Christian  Church,  of  which  it  has  been 
long  considered  the  anticipation  and  the  emblem.2 
It  was  the  commemoration,  not  of  what  man  has 
wrought  for  God,  but  of  what  God  has  wrought  for 
man.  No  baser  thoughts,  no  disturbing  influences, 
could  mar  the  overwhelming  sense  of  thankfulness  with 
which,  as  if  after  a  hard-won  battle,  the  nation  found 

1  See  the  celebrated  sermon  of  Dr. 

Pusey  on  that  text,  Nov.  5,  1837. 

19 


2  Ewald,  ii.  94. 


146 


MOSES  AND  THE  EXODUS. 


Lect.  V. 


its  voice  in  the  first  Hebrew  melody,  in  the  first  burst 
of  national  poetry,1  when  Moses  and  the  children  of 
Israel  met  on  the  Arabian  shore,  met  “Miriam  the 
Prophetess,  the  sister  of  Aaron,”  the  third  member, 
the  eldest  born,  of  that  noble  family,  whose  name 
now  first  appears  in  the  history  of  the  Church,  after¬ 
wards  to  become  so  renowned  through  its  Grecian 
and  European  form  of  Maria  and  Mar y.  She  came 
forth,  as  was  the  wont  of  Hebrew  women  after  some 
great  victory,  to  meet  the  triumphant  host,  with  her 
Egyptian  timbrels,  and  with  dances  of  her  country¬ 
women,  —  Miriam,  who  had  watched  her  infant  brother 
by  the  riverside,  and  now  greeted  him  as  the  deliv¬ 
erer  of  her  people,  or  rather,  if  we  may  with  rever¬ 
ence  say  so,  greeted  the  Divine  Deliverer,  by  the  new 
and  awful  Name,  now  first  clearly  proclaimed  to  her 
family  and  her  nation : 

“  Sing  unto  Jehovah,  for  He  is  ‘  lifted  up  on  liigh,  on  high/ 

The  horse  and  his  rider  hath  He  thrown  into  the  sea. 

My  strength  and  song  is  Jah,  and  He  is  become  my  salvation. 

He  is  my  God,  and  I  will  praise  Him ;  my  father’s  God,  and  I  will  exalt 
Him. 

Jehovah  is  a  man  of  war,  Jehovah  is  His  name. 

Pharaoh’s  chariots  and  his  host  hath  He  cast  into  the  sea. 

His  chosen  captains  also  are  drowned  in  the  Red  Sea. 

The  depths  covered  them,  they  sank  to  the  bottom  as  a  stone. 

Thy  right  hand,  Jehovah,  is  become  glorious  in  power :  Thy  right  hand, 
Jehovah,  hath  dashed  in  pieces  the  enemy. 

And  in  the  greatness  of  Thy  height  Thou  hast  overthrown  them  that  rose 
up  against  Thee. 

Thou  sentest  forth  Thy  wrath,  which  consumed  them  as  stubble : 

And  with  the  blast  of  Thy  nostrils  the  waters  were  gathered  together : 

The  floods  stood  upright  as  a  heap ;  the  depths  were  congealed  in  the  heart 
of  the  sea : 

The  enemy  said  I  will  pursue,  I  will  devastate,  I  will  divide  the  spoil:  my 
desire  shall  be  satisfied  upon  them :  I  will  draw  my  sword,  my  hand 
shall  destroy  them. 

1  Compare  Maurice’s  History  of  Moral  and  Metaphysical  Philosophy ,  11 


I 


Lect.  V.  MOSES  AND  THE  EXODUS.  147 

Thou  didst  blow  with  Thy  blast ;  the  sea  covered  them :  they  sank  like  lead 
in  the  mighty  waters. 

Who  is  like  unto  Thee,  Jehovah,  amongst  the  gods?  Who  is  like  unto 
Thee,  glorious  in  holiness,  fearful  in  praises,  doing  wonders  ? 
Jehovah  shall  reign  for  ever  and  ever.” 


148 


THE  WILDERNESS. 


Lect.  VL 


LECTURE  VI. 

THE  WILDERNESS. 

From  the  Exodus  begins  the  great  period  of  the 
The  com-  life  of  Moses.  On  that  night,  he  is  described 
Sfoses.80  as  first  taking  the  decisive  lead.  Up  to  that 
point  he  and  Aaron  and  Miriam1  appear  almost  on 
an  equality.  But  after  that,  Moses  is  usually  men¬ 
tioned  alone.  Aaron  still  held  the  second  place,  but 
the  character  of  interpreter  to  Moses  which  he  had 
borne  in  speaking  to  Pharaoh  is  withdrawn,  and  it 
would  seem  as  if  Moses  henceforth  became  altogether, 
what  hitherto  he  had  only  been  in  part,  the  Prophet 
of  the  people.  Miriam,  too,  though  always  holding 
the  independent  position  to  which  her  age  entitled 
her,  no  more  appears  as  lending  her  voice  and  song 
to  enforce  her  brother’s  prophetic  power.  Another 
who  occupies  a  place  nearly  equal  to  Aaron,  though 
we  know  but  little  of  him,  is  Hur,  of  the  tribe  of 
Judah,  husband  of  Miriam,  and  grandfather  of  the 
artist  Bezaleel.  The  guide  in  regard  to  the  route 
through  the  wilderness  was,  as  we  shall  see,  Jethro  : 
the  servant,  occupying  the  same  relation  as  Elisha 
afterwards  to  Elijah,  or  Gehazi  to  Elisha,  was  the 
youthful  Hoshea,  afterwards  Joshua. 

But  Moses  is  incontestably  the  chief  personage  of 

1  I  sent  before  thee  Moses  and  Aaron  and  Miriam  (Micah  vi.  4). 


Lect.  VI. 


MOSES  AS  A  LEADER. 


149 


the  whole  history.  In  the  narrative,  the  phrase 
is  constantly  recurring,  “  The  Lord  spake  unto  Importance 
“  Moses,”  “  Moses  spake  unto  the  children  of of  Mose8, 

“  Israel.”  In  the  traditions  of  the  desert,  whether 
late  or  early,  his  name  predominates  over  that  of 
every  one  else:  “The  Wells  of  Moses”  on  the  shores 
of  the  Red  Sea,  “The  Mountain  of  Moses”  (Jebel 
Musa)  near  the  convent  of  S.  Catherine,  “  The  Ravine 
of  Moses”  (Shuk  Musa)  at  Mount  S.  Catherine,  “The 
Valley  of  Moses”  (Wady  Musa)  at  Petra.  “The  Books 
of  Moses”  are  so  called  (as  afterwards  the  Books 
of  Samuel),  in  all  probability,  from  his  being  the 
chief  subject  of  them.  The  very  word  “Mosaic”  has 
been  in  later  times  applied,  in  a  sense  not  used  of 
any  other  saint  of  the  Old  Testament,  to  the  whole 
religion  of  which  he  was  the  expounder.1 

It  has  sometimes  been  attempted  to  reduce  this 
great  character  into  a  mere  passive  instrument  of  the 
Divine  Will,  as  though  he  had  himself  borne  no  con¬ 
scious  part  in  the  actions  in  which  he  figures,  or  the 
messages  which  he  delivers.  This,  however,  is  as  in¬ 
compatible  with  the  general  tenor  of  the  Scriptural 
account,  as  it  is  with  the  common  language  in  which 
he  has  been  described  by  the  Church  in  all  ages. 
The  frequent  addresses  of  the  Divinity  to  him  no 
more  contravene  his  personal  activity  and  intelligence, 
than  in  the  case  of  Elijah,  Isaiah,  or  S.  Paul.  In  the 
New  Testament  the  legislation  of  the  Jews  is  expressly 
ascribed  to  him.  “ Moses  gave  you  circumcision.” 2 

1  Even  as  applied  to  tessellated  the  representative  of  the  religion  of 
pavement  (“  mosaic,”  musivum,  gov-  Moses  (see  an  Essay  of  Redslob,  Zeit- 
aetov,  govaainbv ),  there  is  some  proba-  schrift  der  Deutsch.  Morgenl.  GeseUs. 
bility  that  the  expression  is  derived  xiv.  663). 
from  the  variegated  pavement  of  the  2  John  vii.  22. 

’ater  Temple,  which  had  then  become 


150 


THE  WILDERNESS. 


Lect.  VI. 


“Moses,  because  of  the  hardness  of  your  hearts,  suf¬ 
fered  you” 1  “  Did  not  Moses  give  you  the  law ?  ”  2 

Moses  “accuseth  you”3  S.  Paul  goes  so  far  as  to 
speak  of  him  as  the  founder  of  the  Jewish  religion : 
“  They  were  all  baptized  unto  Moses” 4  He  is  con¬ 
stantly  called  “a  Prophet.”  In  the  ancient  language 
both  of  Jews  and  Christians,  he  was  known  as  a  the 
great  Lawgiver,”  a  the  great  Theologian,”  a  the  great 
Statesman”5  He  must  be  considered,  like  all  the 
saints  and  heroes  of  the  Bible,  as  a  man  of  marvel¬ 
lous  gifts,  raised  up  by  Divine  Providence  for  the 
highest  purpose  to  which  men  could  be  called;  and 
so,  in  a  lesser  degree,  his  name  has  been  applied  in 
later  times:  Ulfilas  was  called  after  him  the  Moses 
of  the  Goths ;  Arpad,  the  Moses  of  the  Hungarians ; 
Benedict,  the  Moses  of  the  Monastic  Orders. 

The  union  of  the  Leader  and  the  Prophet  was  such 
as  Eastern  religion  has  always  admitted  more  easily 
than  Western.  Mahomet,  Abd-el-kader,  Schamyl,  are 
all  illustrations  of  its  possibility.  But,  amongst  the 
heroes  and  saints  of  the  true  religion,  no  such  union 
occurs  again  after  Moses.  This  double  career  may  be 
divided  into  three  parts :  the  approach  by  Rephidim 
to  Sinai ;  the  stay  at  Sinai ;  the  march  from  Sinai  to 
Palestine  by  Kadesh  and  by  Moab.  In  the  first  and 
third  of  these  he  appears  chiefly  as  the  Leader;  in 
the  second,  as  the  Prophet.  Whatever  is  to  be  said 
on  minute  matters  of  topography  has  been  said  else¬ 
where  ;  and,  with  regard  to  all  the  details  of  the 
Israelite  journey,  there  are  many  reasons  why  we 
should  be  content  to  remain  in  suspense  for  the  pres- 


1  Matt,  xviii.  3. 

2  John  vii.  19. 

3  John  v.  45, 

4  1  Cor.  x.  2. 


5  All  these  terms  are  freely  used 
in  Euseb.  Prazp.  Evang.  vii.  8  ;  Philo, 
V.  M.  i.  80 ;  Clem.  Alex.  Strom,  i.  22, 
24. 


Lect.  VI. 


ITS  UNCERTAINTIES. 


151 


ent.  Long  as  the  desert  of  Sinai  has  been  known  to 
Christian  pilgrims,  yet  it  may  almost  be  said  never  to 
have  been  explored  before  the  beginning  of  this  cen¬ 
tury.  We  are  still  at  the  threshold  of  our  knowledge 
concerning  it.  The  older  travellers  never  troubled 
themselves  to  compare  the  general  features  of  the 
desert  with  the  indications  of  the  Sacred  narrative, 
and  therefore  they  usually  missed  the  cardi-  uncertain- 
nal  points  of  dispute.  A  signal  instance  of  Desert, 
this  may  be  seen  in  the  travels  of  Pococke,  Professor 
of  Hebrew  at  Oxford  in  the  seventeenth  century,  who, 
taking  with  him  all  the  Oriental  learning  which  that 
office  implies,  yet  gives  an  account  of  the  Sinaitic  des¬ 
ert,  such  as  entirely  conceals  from  us  the  very  localities 
which  are  most  important  for  the  whole  comparison 
of  the  history  and  geography.  He  says  nothing  of 
the  plain  at  the  foot  of  one  of  the  claimants  to  the 
name  of  Sinai;  he  says  nothing  of  the  commanding 
mountain  which  from  the  earliest  times  has  been  the 
other  claimant.  He  went  through  the  sacred  locali¬ 
ties  with  his  eyes  closed  to  the  impressions  which  all 
now  see  to  be  most  important  and  most  significant. 
We  are  still  therefore  in  the  condition  of  discoverers, 
and  if  we  are  thus  compelled  to  abstain  from  positive 
conclusions,  it  is  a  suspense  which  we  need  not  be 
afraid  to  avow,  and  which  in  this  instance  is  the  less 
inconvenient,  because  the  very  uniformity  of  nature 
by  which  it  is  occasioned  also  enables  us  to  form  an 
image  of  the  general  scenes,  even  where  the  particu¬ 
lar  scene  is  unknown ;  and  many  will  feel  at  a  dis¬ 
tance,  what  many,  I  doubt  not,  have  felt  on  the  spot, 
that,  in  speaking  of  such  sacred  events,  uncertainty 
is  the  best  safeguard  for  reverence ;  and  suspense  as 
to  the  exact  details  of  form  and  locality  is  the  most 


152 


THE  WILDERNESS. 


Lect.  VI. 


fitting  approach  for  the  consideration  of  the  presence 
of  Him  who  has  “  made  darkness  His  secret  place,  His 
“  pavilion  round  about  Him  with  dark  water,  and  thick 
“  clouds  to  cover  them  .” 

1.  In  the  flight  from  Egypt,  the  people  of  Israel 
disappear  once  more  from  the  view  of  the  Gentile 
world.  The  notices,  scanty  as  they  were,  which  we 
have  of  their  earlier  history,  almost  entirely  cease  on 
their  entrance  into  the  desert.  A  solitary  glimpse  of 
their  wanderings,  recorded  by  Tacitus,  is  all  that  has 
penetrated  into  Pagan  records.  He  relates1  how,  in 
the  absence  of  water,  they  threw  themselves  on  the 
ground  in  despair,  when  a  herd  of  wild  asses  guided 
them  to  a  rock  overshadowed  by  palm-trees,  where 
Moses  discovered  for  them  a  copious  spring.  A  seven 
days’  journey  brought  them  to  Palestine ;  and  the  sab¬ 
bath  was  instituted  to  commemorate  their  safe  arri¬ 
val  within  that  period,  as  their  deliverance  from  thirst 
in  the  desert  was  commemorated  by  the  erection  of 
the  image  of  an  ass  in  their  most  holy  place.  On 
this  scene  the  curtain  falls,  and,  as  far  as  the  Western 
world  is  concerned,  it  is  no  more  lifted  up,  till  Pom- 
pey  entered  the  Holy  of  Holies,  and  found,  not  as  he 
doubtless  expected  this  strange  memorial  of  the  wil¬ 
derness,  but  “  vacuam  sedem,  inania  arcana.”2 

To  us,  on  the  other  hand,  the  history  which  fills 
Theim-  this  space,  and  especially  the  earlier  portion 
the 4 wilder-  of  it,  has  become  almost  a  part  of  our  minds. 
Christian  The  onward  march  of  the  history,  the  suc- 
history;  cessive  localities  through  which  it  takes  us, 
at  least  till  the  conquest  of  Canaan,  are  an  epitome 
of  human  life  itself.  The  reaction  which  followed  at 
the  Waters  of  Strife,  upon  the  exultation  of  the  Pas- 


1  Hist.  v.  3. 


2  Tacitus,  Hist.  v.  9. 


Lect.  VI.  ITS  IMPORTANCE  TO  JEWISH  HISTORY. 


153 


sage  of  the  Red  Sea,  has  been  fitly  described  as  the 
likeness  of  the  reaction  which,  from  the  days  of  Moses 
downwards,  has  followed  on  every  great  national 
emancipation,  on  every  just  and  beneficent  revolution ; 
when  “  the  evils  which  it  has  caused  are  felt,  and  the 
“  evils  which  it  has  removed  are  felt  no  longer.” 1 
The  wilderness,  as  it  intervenes  between  Egypt  and 
the  Land  of  Promise,  with  all  its  dangers  and  conso¬ 
lations,  is,  as  Coleridge  would  have  said,  not  allegori¬ 
cal,  hut  tautegorical,  of  the  events  which  in  almost 
unconscious  metaphor  we  designate  by  those  figures. 
It  is  startling,  as  we  traverse  it  even  at  this  day,  to 
feel  that  the  hard  stony  track  under  our  feet,  the 
springs  to  which  we  look  forward  at  the  end  of  our 
day’s  march,  the  sense  of  contrast  with  what  has  been 
and  with  what  is  to  be,  are  the  very  materials  out 
of  which  the  imagination  of  all  ages  has  constructed 
its  idea  of  the  journey  of  life. 

But  this  period  had  a  special  bearing  on  the  history 
of  Israel.  It  was  their  beginning  as  a  people  :  t0  Jewigh 
it  was  their  conversion  or  their  reconversion  hlstory; 
to  the  true  faith ;  it  had  all  the  faults  and  all  the  ex¬ 
cellences  which  such  a  new  start  of  life  always  pre¬ 
sents.  With  all  its  faults  and  shortcomings,  it  was  the 
spring-time  of  their  national  existence.  “I  remember 
“thee,  the  kindness  of  thy  youth,  the  love  of  thine 
“  espousals,  when  thou  wentest  after  Me  in  the  wilder- 
“ness,  in  a  land  that  was  not  sown.”2  “When  Israel 
“was  a  child,  then  I  loved  him.”3  The  Law,  we  are 
told,  was  “  a  school-master  to  bring  men  to  Christ.” 
“  Mount  Sinai  in  Arabia  ”  is  opposed,  both  in  prepara¬ 
tion  and  in  contrast,  to  the  heavenly  and  free  Jerusa- 

1  Macaulay’s  History  of  England ,  2  Jer.  ii.  2. 

;h.  xi.  3  Hos.  xi.  1. 


20 


154 


THE  WILDERNESS. 


Lect.  VI. 


lem  which  is  above.  But,  even  in  the  earlier  stages 
of  the  history  of  the  Jewish  Church,  the  Law  was  a 
school-master,  and  Mount  Sinai  was  a  school,  for  the 
dispensation  and  for  the  possession  even  of  the  earthly 
Jerusalem. 

2.  It  is  difficult,  under  the  circumstances,  to  con- 
its  pecu-  ceive  a  fitter  scene  for  a  new  revelation  than 
lianties.  was  wiiderness  of  Sinai  to  the  Israelites. 

They  had  left  the  land  of  Egypt :  they  had  come  out 
of  the  house  of  bondage,  into  a  land  as  different,  into 
a  life  as  new,  as  it  was  possible  to  conceive.  Instead 
of  the  green  valley  of  the  one  abundant,  beneficent 
river,  where  water  and  vegetation  never  failed,  they 
were  in  “the  great  and  terrible  wilderness,”  where  a 
spring  in  each  day’s  march,  —  the  bitter  waters  of 
Marah  here,  the  isolated  grove  of  Elim  there,  —  was 
all  that  they  could  expect  to  cheer  them.  Instead  of 
the  endless  life  and  stir  which  ran  through  the  teem¬ 
ing  population  of  Egypt,  the  song  and  dance  and 
feast ;  the  armies  passing  through  the  hundred  gates ; 
the  flags  with  their  brilliant  colors  flying  from  the 
painted  gateways ;  the  king  at  the  head  of  vast  pro¬ 
cessions  with  drum  and  cymbal,  and  the  rattle  of  his 
thousand  chariots;  there  was  the  deep  silence  of  the 
desert  broken  by  no  echo  of  human  voice,  by  no  cry 
of  innumerable  birds,  by  no  sound  of  rushing  waters, 
—  broken  only  by  the  trumpet,  which  at  early  dawn 
and  fall  of  day  roused  the  tribes  from  their  slumbers, 
or  called  them  to  their  rest.  For  a  time  the  Red  Sea 
was  in  sight.  Once,  after  they  had  struck  far  into 
the  desert,  the  hills  opened 1  before  them  (we  may  be 
allowed  to  dwell  upon  it  as  the  most  authentic  spot 
ascertainable  in  their  wanderings),  and  the  familiar 

1  Num.  xxxiii.  10.  See  Sinai  and  Palestine,  38,  70. 


Lect.  VI. 


ITS  PECULIARITIES. 


155 


sea,  their  ancient  enemy  and  their  ancient  friend, 
burst  with  its  flashing  waters  upon  them,  and  they 
encamped  once  more  upon  its  shining  beach ;  and 
looked  once  more  upon  the  distant  range  of  the  Afri¬ 
can  hills,  the  hills  of  the  land  of  their  captivity.  It 
was  a  moment,  such  as  occurs  from  time  to  time  in 
the  history  of  men  and  of  nations  to  remind  them 
from  what  dangers  and  by  what  means  they  have  es¬ 
caped.  Onwards  they  went,  and  the  desert  itself  now 
changed  into  vaster  and  stranger  shapes  than  they 
had  ever  known  before.  Here  and  there,  it  may  be, 
amongst  the  host,  was  an  Israelite  vdio  had  seen  the 
granite  hills  of  Ethiopia ;  but,  taking  them  generally, 
the  ascent  of  these  tremendous  passes,  the  sight  of 
those  towering  peaks,  must  have  been  to  them  as  the 
awful  retreats  of  Delphi  to  the  invaders  of  Greece,  as 
the  Alps  to  the  invaders  of  Italy.  Rumors  of  these 
mysterious  mountains  no  doubt  had  reached  them  even 
in  their  house  of  bondage.  “A  three  days’  journey 
“into  the  desert  to  sacrifice  to  the  Lord”  was  a  pro¬ 
posal  not  unfamiliar  to  the  ears  of  Pharaoh :  and,  as 
they  now  mounted  into  the  higher  region  of  that 
desert,  they  would  perceive  traces  that  the  Egyptians 
had  been  there  before  them.  Here  they  might  see  a 
lonely  hill,  surrounded  by  ancient  monuments,  —  sepul¬ 
chres,  temples,  quarries,  —  unquestionably  the  work  of 
Egyptian  hands.1  There  they  would  see,  in  a  retired 
valley,  hieroglyphics  carved  deep  in  the  soft  sandstone 
rock,  extending  back  to  the  builder  of  the  great 
pyramid,  whose  figure  can  be  traced  here  in  the 
desert  cliffs,  when  it  has  perished  everywhere  in  his 
own  tomb  and  country.  But  no  report,  no  experience 
of  individuals,  could  have  prepared  them  for  the  scene, 

1  Sinai  and  Palestine ,  24,  49. 


156 


THE  WILDERNESS. 


Lect.  VI. 


as  it  must  have  presented  itself  to  a  whole  host  (tak¬ 
ing  it  at  its  largest  or  its  smallest  numbers)  scaling 
that  fortress,  that  towering  outpost  of  the  Holy  Land. 
Staircase  after  staircase,  formed  by  no  human  hand  in 
the  side  of  the  rocky  walls,  brought  them  (by  what¬ 
ever  approach  they  came)  into  the  loftier  and  still 
loftier  regions  of  the  mountain  platform.  Well  may 
the  Arab  tribes  suppose  that  these  rocky  ladders  were 
called  forth  by  the  rod  of  Moses,  to  help  their  upward 
progress.1 

3.  And  now  they  approach  the  first  great  halting- 
Rephidim.  place,  known  by  that  special  name  Rephidim , 
‘‘the  places  of  rest.”  We  know  not  the  spot  with 
certainty.  Yet  of  all  localities  hitherto  imagined,  that 
which  was  believed  to  be  so  in  the  fifth  century  at 
least  answers  the  requirements  well ;  —  the  beautiful 
palm-grove,  now  and  for  many  ages  past  called  the 
valley  of  Paran  or  Feiran. 

At  any  rate  some  such  spot  is  implied  both  by  the 
name  and  by  the  twofold  encounter  which  here  for  the 
first  time  occurs  with  the  native  tribes  of  the  desert. 
We  are  too  much  accustomed  to  think  that  the  Pen¬ 
insula  of  Sinai,  when  the  Israelites  passed  through, 
was  entirely  uninhabited.  This,  however,  is  not  the 
case  even  now,  still  less  was  it  so  then.  Two  main 
streams  of  population  at  present  occupy  the  pastures 
of  the  wilderness,  and  two  also  appear  at  the  time 
Amalek.  of  the  Israelite  migration.  The  first  was  the 
great  tribe  of  Amalek,  ruled,  as  it  would  seem,  by  a 
chief  who  bore  the  title  of  king,  and  the  hereditary 
name  of  Agag,2 — themselves  a  wide-spreading  clan, — 
“ first  of  the  nations;”3  and,  like  the  feebler  Bedouins 

1  Sinai  and  Palestine ,  71.  3  Num.  xxiv.  20. 

2  Num.  xxiv.  7 ;  1  Sam.  xv. 


Lect.  VI. 


REPHIDIM. 


157 


of  modern  days,  extending  their  excursions  far  into 
Palestine,  and  leaving  their  name,  even  before  history 
commences,  on  mountains  in  the  centre  of  the  coun¬ 
try.1  This  fierce  tribe,  occupying  as  it  would  seem 
the  whole  north  of  the  peninsula,  were,  as  might  natu¬ 
rally  be  expected,  the  first  to  contest  the  entrance  of 
the  new  people.  Wherever  Rephidim  may  be,  Battle  of 
it  was  evidently  a  place  of  sufficient  impor-  RePhldlm- 
tance  to  induce  the  Amalekites  to  defend  it  to  the 
uttermost.  According  to  the  account  of  Josephus,  they 
had  gathered  to  this  spot  all  the  forces  of  the  desert 
tribes  from  Petra  to  the  Mediterranean,  and,  accord¬ 
ing  to  a  portion  of  the  Mosaic  narrative,  they  began 
the  attack  by  harassing  the  rear  of  the  Israelite  host. 
It  is  a  scene  of  which  the  significance  is  indicated, 
not  so  much  by  the  description  of  the  event  itself, 
as  by  its  accompaniments  and  its  consequences.  The 
battle  is  fought  and  won  by  the  youthful  warrior  wrho 
here  appears  for  the  first  time,  —  Joshua,  the  Ephraim- 
ite.  But  Moses  is  on  “  the  hill,”  overlooking  the  fight ; 
he  stands,  in  the  Oriental  attitude  of  prayer,  his  hands 
stretched  out,  as  if  to  draw  down  and  receive  bless¬ 
ings  from  above.  Beside  him,  holding  up  his  arms 
as  they  fail  from  weariness,  are  his  brother  and  (if  we 
may  trust  Josephus2)  his  brother-in-law,  one  whose 
name  occurs  but  seldom,  yet  always  so  as  to  show  a 
high  importance  beyond  what  we  are  actually  told 
concerning  him,  Hur,  of  the  tribe  of  Judah,  grand¬ 
father  of  the  builder  of  the  tabernacle,  husband  of 
the  prophetess  Miriam.  The  victory  is  gained;  and 

n  the  summit  of  the  hill  was  erected  a  rude  altar, 

1  Judg.  v.  14  ;  xii.  15.  Compare  also  north  of  Jerusalem.  Robinson,  Bib 
the  “  Tombs  of  the  Amalekites,”  an-  j Res.  iii.  287. 

3ient  monuments  so  called,  a  few  miles  2  Jos.  Ant.  iii.  2,  4. 


158 


THE  WILDERNESS. 


Lect.  YI. 


named  or  inscribed  by  two  words  signifying  “  Jehovah 
is  my  banner;”  and  a  fragment  of  the  hymn  of 
victory  was  transmitted  through  Joshua  to  after-ages, 
probably  in  the  book  of  the  Wars  of  Jehovah,  “  As 
“  the  hand  is  on  the  throne  of  Jehovah,1  so  there 
“  shall  be  war  between  J ehovah  and  Amalek  from 
“  generation  to  generation  ”  The  situation  well  ac¬ 
cords  with  the  spot  consecrated  in  Christian  times  as 
the  sanctuary  of  Paran.  In  the  fifth  century,  a  city, 
a  church,  an  episcopal  palace,  had  gathered  round  it ; 
and  pilgrims  flocked  to  it  in  considerable  numbers. 
In  the  Jewish  Church  the  memory  of  the  first  ene¬ 
my  of  the  Chosen  People  was  long  preserved ;  and 
the  slaughter  which  Joshua  had  begun  was  carried 
out  to  extermination,  first  under  Saul  and  then  under 
David.  Its  last  trace  appears  in  the  offensive  name 
of  “  Agagite,”  applied  to  Haman  in  the  book  of  Esther. 

This  was  the  first  hostile  encounter.  Immediately 
in  connection  with  this  we  read  of  the  friendly 
encounter  with  that  other  tribe,  which  is  here 
frequently  mentioned  in  the  same  close  contact  and 
contrast  with  Amalek.  On  the  shores,  as  it  would 
seem,  of  the  Gulf  of  Akaba,  dwelt  the  Kenites,  a  clan 
Jethro.  of  the  vast  tribe  of  Midian.  We  have  already 
seen  its  Chief  or  Priest,  variously  named  Jethro  or 
Hobab  (which  in  the  form2  of  Shouaib  is  his  usual 
Arab  designation  at  the  present  day).  Of  all  the 
characters  that  come  across  us  in  this  stage  of  their 
history,  he  is  the  purest  type  of  the  Arabian  chief. 
In  the  sight  of  his  numerous  flocks  feeding  round  the 
well  in  Midian,  in  his  courtesy  to  the  stranger  who 


The 

Kenites. 


1  Exod.  xvii.  16;  see  a  similar  ex-  2  Ewald,  Geschichte,  ii.  59,  note, 
pression  as  an  adjuration  in  Gen.  xiv. 

22,  and  Deut.  xxxii.  40. 


Lect.  VI. 


THE  KENITES. 


159 


became  at  once  his  slave  and  his  son-in-law,  we  seem 
to  be  carried  back  to  the  days  of  Jacob  and  Laban. 
And  now  the  old  chief,1  attracted  from  far  by  the 
tidings  of  his  kinsman’s  fame  finds  him  out  in  the 
heart  of  the  mountains  of  Sinai,  “  encamped  by  the 
“  Mount  of  God.”  “  I,  Jethro,  thy  father-in-law,  am 
“  come  unto  thee,  and  thy  wife,  and  her  two  sons 
“  with  her.  And  Moses  went  out  to  meet  his  father- 
“  in-law,  and  did  obeisance,  and  kissed  him,”  —  gave 
the  full  Arab  salutation  on  each  side  of  the  head, — 
“  and  they  asked  each  other  of  their  welfare,”  —  the 
burst  of  question  and  answer,  which  renders  these 
meetings  so  vociferous  at  first,  rapidly  subsiding  into 
total  silence,  as  then,  hand  in  hand,  “they  come  into 
“  the  tent,”  and  confer  privately  of  what  each  really 
wishes  to  know.  He  listens,  and  with  his  own  priestly 
sanctity  acknowledges  the  greatness  of  his  kinsman’s 
God;  he  officiates  (if  one  may  so  say)  like  a  second 
Melchizedek,  the  High  Priest  of  the  Desert ;  “  he  took 
“  a  burnt  offering  and  sacrifices  for  God ;  and  Aaron 
“  came,”  even  Aaron  the  future  priest  of  Israel,  “  and 
“  all  the  elders  of  Israel,  to  eat  bread,”  to  join  in  the 
solemn  feast  of  thanksgiving,  “with  Moses’  father-in- 
“law,  before  God.”  He  is  the  first  friend,  the  first 
counsellor,  the  first  guide,  that  they  have  met,  since 
they  cut  themselves  off  from  the  wisdom  of  Egypt, 
and  they  hang  upon  his  lips  like  children.  He  sees 
Moses  wearing  himself  away  by  undertaking  labor 
that  is  too  heavy  for  him;  and  he  suggests  to  him 
the  same  subordination  of  rulers  and  judges,  of  elders 
or  sheiks,  that  still  forms  the  constitution  of  the 
Arabs  of  the  peninsula;  and  “Moses  hearkened  to  the 

1  In  the  Mussulman  traditions  he  ous  El  Khudr.  (See  D'Herbelot , 
is  here  represented  as  the  mysteri-  “Moussa.”) 


160 


THE  WILDERNESS. 


Lect.  VI 


“  voice  of  his  father-in-law,  and  did  all  that  he  had 
“  said.”  And  out  of  this  simple  arrangement  sprang 
the  gradations  that  we  trace  long  afterwards  in  the 
constitution  of  the  Hebrew  commonwealth.  “  And 
“  when  he  was  to  depart  to  his  own  land  and  to  his 
“  own  kindred,  Moses  prayed  him  not  to  leave  them ;  ” 
in  the  trackless  desert,  he,  with  his  Bedouin  instincts 
and  his  knowledge  of  the  wilderness,  would  “  know 
“  how  they  were  to  encamp,  and  would  be  to  them 
“  instead  of  eyes.”  The  alliance  so  formed  was  never 
broken.  In  subsequent  ages,  when  Israel  had  long 
since  become  a  settled  and  civilized  people,  in  their 
own  land,  a  stranger’s  eye  would  have  at  once  dis¬ 
cerned  little  groups  of  settlers  here  and  there  retain¬ 
ing  their  Arabian  customs,  yet  one  with  the  masters 
of  the  soil.  In  the  caverns  of  Engedi,  on  the  south¬ 
ern  frontier  of  Judah,  the  “children  of  the  Kenite” 
were  to  be  seen  dwelling  among  the  people.  The 
valley  opening  down  from  the  east  to  the  Jordan, 
opposite  Jericho,  still  bears  the  name  of  Hobab.  Far 
in  the  north,  by  Kedesh-Naphtali,  a  grove  of  oaks 
was  called  from  the  nomad  encampment  hard  by, 
“  the  oak  of  the  loading  of  tents.”  It  is  the  tent  of 
Heber  the  Kenite,  whose  wife  Jael  will  make  use  of 
the  show  of  Arabian  hospitality  to  slay  the  enemy 
of  Israel.  In  the  streets  of  Jerusalem,  during  the  final 
siege,  a  band  of  wild  Arabs  will  be  seen,  dwelling  in 
tents,  drinking  no  wine.  They  are  “the  children  of 
“  Jehonadab  the  son  of  Kechab,”  “the  Kenites  that  came 
“  of  Hemath  the  father  of  the  house  of  Rechab.” 1 

4.  Besides  the  dangers  from  the  desert  tribes,  this 
The  dim-  earlier  stage  of  the  wanderings  also  brings 
the  Desert,  out  those  natural  difficulties  of  the  desert- 

1  Judg.  i.  16,  iv.  11 ;  Jer.  xxxv.  2 ;  1  Chron.  ii.  55. 


Lect.  VI. 


ITS  DIFFICULTIES. 


161 


journey,  which,  through  the  guidance  of  Moses,  were 
to  be  overcome.  It  is  not  here  intended  to  enter 
upon  the  vexed  question  of  the  support  of  Israel  in 
the  wilderness.  There  are  two  classes  of  readers  to 
whom  it  presents  no  perplexity,  —  those  who  are  dis¬ 
posed  to  treat  the  whole  as  poetry  rather  than  as 
history,  and  those  who  have  no  scruple  in  inventing 
miraculous  interferences  which  have  no  foundation  in 
the  sacred  narrative.1  It  concerns  those  only  who  feel 
the  truth  and  soberness  of  the  narrative  too  strongly  to 
venture  on  either  of  these  expedients.  They,  be  they 
few  or  many,  may  be  content  to  withhold  a  hasty 
judgment  on  points  which  the  Scripture  has  left  un¬ 
determined,  and  to  which  the  localities  and  the  phe¬ 
nomena  of  the  desert  give  no  certain  clew.  We  can¬ 
not  repudiate  altogether  the  existence  of  natural 
causes,  unless  we  go  so  far  as  to  maintain  that  moun¬ 
tains  and  palm-trees,  quails  and  waters,  wind  and 
earthquake,  were  mere  creations  of  the  moment  to 
supply  momentary  wants;  we  cannot  repudiate  alto¬ 
gether  the  intervention  of  a  Providence,  strange,  un¬ 
expected,  and  impressive,  in  the  highest  degree,  unless 
we  are  prepared  to  reject  the  whole  story  of  the  stay 
in  the  wilderness. 

In  the  case  of  each  of  the  main  supports  of  the 
Israelites,  there  have  been  memorials  preserved  down 
to  our  own  time,  of  the  hold  acquired  on  the  recol¬ 
lections  of  the  Jewish  and  the  Christian  Church.  The 
flowing  of  the  water  from  the  rock  has  been  L  The 
localized  in  various  forms  by  Arab  traditions.  water‘ 

The  isolated  rock  in  the  valley  of  the  Leja,  near 
Mount  S.  Catherine,  with  the  twelve  mouths,  or  fis¬ 
sures,  for  the  twelve  tribes,  was  pointed  out  as  the 

1  Sinai  and  Palestine ,  24-27. 


21 


162 


THE  WILDERNESS. 


Lect.  VX 


monument  of  the  wonder  at  least  as  early  as  the 
seventh  century.  The  living  streams  of  Feiran,  of 
Shuk  Musa,  of  Wady  Musa,  have  each  been  connected 
with  the  event  by  the  names  bestowed  upon  them. 
The  Jewish  tradition,  to  which  the  Apostle  alludes, 
amplified  the  simple  statement  in  the  Pentateuch  to 
the  prodigious  extent  of  supposing  a  rock  or  ball  of 
water  constantly  accompanying  them.1  The  Christian 
image,  based  upon  this,  passed  on  into  the  Catacombs, 
where  Peter,  under  the  figure  of  Moses,  strikes  the 
rock,  from  which  he  takes  his  name ;  and  it  has  found 
its  final  and  most  elevated  application  in  one  of  the 
greatest  of  English  hymns, — 

“  Rock  of  Ages,  cleft  for  me, 

Let  me  hide  myself  in  Thee.” 

The  manna,  in  like  manner,  according  to  the  Jew- 
2  The  ish  tradition  of  Josephus,  and  the  belief  of 
manna.  the  Arab  tribes,  and  of  the  Greek  Church  of 
the  present  day,  is  still  found  in  the  droppings  from 
the  tamarisk  bushes  which  abound  in  this  part  of  the 
desert.2  The  more  critical  spirit  of  modern  times  has 
been  led  to  dwell  on  the  distinction  between  the  ex¬ 
isting  manna,  and  that  described  in  the  Book  of  Num¬ 
bers;3  and  the  identification  is  further  rendered  pre¬ 
carious  by  the  insufficiency  of  the  present  supply4  in 
the  Desert  of  Sinai.  It  became  afterwards  a  favorite 
figure  in  Christian  writings,  to  express  the  heavenly 
sustenance  of  the  soul,  either  in  the  Eucharist  or  in 
our  spiritual  life  generally.  Of  all  the  typical  scenes 


1  See  the  article  “  Beer,”  in  Smith’s  4  In  Persia,  however,  and  in  South 

Dictionary  of  the  Bible.  Africa,  the  sustenance  afforded  by 

2  Sinai  and  Palestine ,  26,  note.  this  kind  of  manna  is  said  to  be  very 

3  Num.  xi.  7,  8.  considerable. 


Lect.  VI. 


THE  MANNA. 


163 


represented  in  the  celebrated  Ammergau  Mystery, 
none  is  more  natural  or  touching,  than  that  in  which 
the  whole  multitude  of  the  Israelites,  in  every  vari¬ 
ety  of  age,  sex,  and  character,  appear  looking  up 
with  one  ardent  expectation  to  the  downward  flight 
of  the  celestial  food,  fluttering  over  the  hundreds  of 
upturned  heads,  according  to  that  fanciful  and  child 
like  but  beautiful  conception  of  the  descent  of  the 
manna.  The  historical  origin  of  this  sacred  figure 
was  always  carried  back  beyond  Palestine  to  the 
desert ;  a  portion  of  it  was  laid  up  as  a  relic 1  by  the 
Ark  for  this  very  purpose,  “that  they  might  see  the 
“  bread  wherewith  their  fathers  were  fed  in  the  wil¬ 
derness.” 2  And  a  Christian  poet  has  well  caught, 
in  “  The  Song  of  the  Manna-Gatherers,”  the  freshness, 
the  monotony,  and  the  transitional  character  of  the 
whole  passage  through  the  desert,  and  at  the  same 
time  has  blended  together  the  natural  and  the  super¬ 
natural  in  that  union  which  is  at  once  most  Biblical 
and  most  philosophical:  — 

“  Comrades,  haste !  the  tent’s  tall  shading 
Lies  along  the  level  sand, 

Far  and  faint:  the  stars  are  fading 
O’er  the  gleaming  western  strand, 

Airs  of  morning 
Freshen  the  bleak  burning  land. 

“  Haste,  or  e’er  the  third  hour  glowing 
With  its  eager  thirst  prevail, 

O’er  the  moist  pearls,  now  bestrowing 
Thymy  slope  and  rushy  vale. 


“  Comrades  —  what  our  sires  have  told  us, 
W atch  and  wait,  for  it  will  come. 


1  Ex.  xvi.  32-34 ;  Hebr.  ix.  4. 


2  John  vi.  31,  49  ;  1  Cor.  x.  3. 


364 


MOSES  AND  THE  WANDERINGS. 


Lect.  VI. 


“  Not  by  manna  show’rs  at  morning 

Shall  our  board  be  then  supplied, 
But  a  strange  pale  gold,  adorning 
Many  a  tufted  mountain’s  side, 
Yearly  feed  us, 

Year  by  year  our  murmurings  chide. 

“  There,  no  prophet’s  touch  awaiting, 

From  each  cool  deep  cavern  start 
Bills,  that  since  their  first  creating 

Ne’er  have  ceased  to  sing  their  part ; 
Oft  we  hear  them 

In  our  dreams,  with  thirsty  heart.” 1 


1  Keble’s  Lyra  Innocentium, 


Lect.  VII. 


SINAI  AND  THE  LAW. 


165 


4 


LECTURE  VII. 

SINAI  AND  THE  LAW. 

Rephidim  was  but  the  threshold  of  Sinai.  "In  the 
“  third  month  they  departed  from  Rephidim,  March 
"  and  pitched  in  the  wilderness  of  Sinai.”  On-  phidim. 
wards  and  upwards,  after  their  long  halt,  exulting  in 
their  first  victory,  they  advanced  deeper  and  deeper 
into  the  mountain-ranges,  they  knew  not  whither. 
They  knew  only  that  it  was  for  some  great  end,  for 
some  mighty  sacrifice,  for  some  solemn  disclosure,  such 
as  they  had  never  before  witnessed.  Onwards  they 
went,  and  the  mountains  closed  around  them ;  upwards 
through  winding  valley,  and  under  high  clifij  and  over 
rugged  pass,  and  through  gigantic  forms,  on  which  the 
marks  of  creation  even  now  seem  fresh  and  powerful ; 
and  at  last,  through1  all  the  different  valleys,  the  whole 
body  of  the  people  were  assembled.  On  their  right 
hand  and  on  their  left  rose  long  successions  of  lofty 
rocks,  forming  a  vast  avenue,  like  the  approaches 
which  they  had  seen  leading  to  the  Egyptian  tem¬ 
ples  between  colossal  figures  of  men  and  of  gods.  At 
the  end  of  this  broad  avenue,  rising  immediately  out 
of  the  level  plain  on  which  they  were  encamped,  tow- 

1  With  regard  to  the  locality  I  have  expressions  sufficiently  wide  to  include 
seen  no  cause  to  alter  the  opinion  any  spot  which  may  be  selected  in 
maintained  in  Sinai  and  Palestine ,  the  neighborhood  of  Jebel  Mousa. 
43-44  ;  but  I  have  purposely  left  the 


166 


SINAI  AND  THE  LAW. 


lect.  vn. 


ered  the  massive  cliffs  of  Sinai,  like  the  huge  altar 
of  some  natural  temple;  encircled  by  peaks  of  every 
shape  and  height,  the  natural  pyramids  of  the  desert. 
In  this  sanctuary,  secluded  from  all  earthly  things, 
raised  high  above  even  the  wilderness  itself,  arrived, 
as  it  must  have  seemed  to  them,  at  the  very  end  of 
the  world  —  they  waited  for  the  Eevelation  of  God. 
How  would  He  make  Himself  known  to  them?  Would 
it  be,  as  they  had  seen  in  those  ancient  temples  of 
Egypt,  under  the  similitude  of  any  figure,  “the  like- 
“  ness  of  male  or  female,  the  likeness  of  any  beast 
“  that  is  upon  the  earth,  or  the  likeness  of  any  fowl 
“  that  flieth  in  the  air,  or  the  likeness  of  anything  that 
“  creepeth  on  the  ground,  or  the  likeness  of  any  fish 
“that  is  in  the  waters  under  the  earth?”  Would  it 
be  any,  or  all  of  these  forms,  under  which  they  would 
at  last  see  Him,  who,  with  a  mighty  hand,  had  brought 
them  up  out  of  the  land  of  Egypt  ? 

These  questions,  or  like  to  these,  are  what  must 
have  occurred  to  the  Israelites  on  the  morning  of  the 
mighty  day  when  they  stood  beneath  the  Mount. 

The  outward  scene  might  indeed  prepare  them  for 
Sinai.  what  was  to  come.  They  stood,  as  I  have 
described,  in  a  vast  sanctuary,  not  made  with  hands, 
—  a  sanctuary  where  every  outward  shape  of  life,  ani¬ 
mal  or  vegetable,  such  as  in  Egypt  had  attracted  their 
wonder  and  admiration,  was  withdrawn.  Bare  and  un¬ 
clothed,  the  mountains  rose  around  them ;  their  very 
shapes  and  colors  were  such  as  to  carry  their  thoughts 
back  to  the  days  of  old  creation,  “from  everlasting  to 
“  everlasting,  before  the  mountains  were  brought  forth, 
“  or  ever  the  earth  and  the  world  were  made.” 1  At  last 

1  See  Ps.  xc.  2,  ascribed  to  Moses.  For  this  aspect  of  the  mountains,  see 
Sinai  and  Palestine ,  pp.  12,  13. 


Lect.  VII. 


DARKNESS  OF  SINAI. 


167 


the  morning  broke,  and  every  eye  was  fixed  on  the 
summit  of  the  height.  Was  it  any  earthly  form,  was 
it  anjr  distinct  shape,  that  unveiled  itself  ?  .  .  .  . 
There  were  thunders,  there  were  lightnings,  there  was 
the  voice  of  a  trumpet 1  exceeding  loud ;  but  on  the 
Mount  itself  there  was  a  thick  cloud — darkness,  and 
clouds,  and  thick  darkness.  It  was  “  the  secret  place 
“  of  thunder.” 2  On  the  summit  of  the  mountain,  Prophetic 
on  the  skirts  of  the  dark  cloud,  or  within  it,  Moses, 
was  Moses  himself  withdrawn  from  view.  It  is  this 
which  represents  to  us  the  seclusion  so  essential  to 
the  Eastern  idea  —  within  certain  limits,  so  essential  to 
any  idea  —  of  the  Prophet;  that, 


“  Separate  from  the  world,  his  breast 
Might  deeply  take  and  strongly  keep 
The  print  of  Heaven.” 


1  It  is  well  known  that  no  volcanic 
phenomena  exist  in  the  desert  to  ac¬ 
count  for  these  appearances.  In  fact, 
all  the  expressions  used  in  the  Sacred 
writers  are  those  which  are  usually 
employed  in  the  Hebrew  Scriptures 
to  describe  a  thunder-storm.  For  the 
effects  of  a  thunder-storm  at  Mount 
Sinai,  compare  Dr.  Stewart’s  Tent 
and  Khan ,  139,  140:  “Every  bolt  as 
“  it  burst,  with  the  roar  of  a  cannon, 
“  seemed  to  awaken  a  series  of  dis- 
“  tinct  echoes  on  every  side ;  .... 
“  they  swept  like  a  whirlwind  among 
“  the  higher  mountains,  becoming 
“  faint  as  some  mighty  peak  inter- 
“  vened,  and  bursting  with  undimin- 
“  ished  volume  through  some  yawning 
“  cleft,  till  the  very  ground  trembled 
“  with  the  concussion.  ...  It  seemed 
“  as  if  the  mountains  of  the  whole  pen- 
“  insula  were  answering  one  another 
“  in  a  chorus  of  the  deepest  bass. 
“  Ever  and  anon  a  flash  of  lightning 


“  dispelled  the  pitchy  darkness  and 
“  lit  up  the  Mount  as  if  it  had  been 
“  day ;  then,  after  the  interval  of  a 
“  few  seconds,  came  the  peal  of  thun- 
“  der,  bursting  like  a  shell,  to  scatter 
“  its  echoes  to  the  four  quarters  of  the 
“  heavens,  and  overpowering  for  a 
“  moment  the  loud  howlings  of  the 
“  wind.”  Mr.  Drew  witnessed  a  thun¬ 
der-storm  at  Serbal,  and  exclaimed, 
unconsciously,  “  How  exactly  like  the 
sound  of  a  trumpet !  ”  Compare  the 
descriptions  of  the  event  in  Jos.  Ant. 
iii.  5,  2 ;  Judg.  v.  4  ;  Ps.  Ixviii.  7,  8, 
9  ;  in  each  of  which,  to  the  other  im¬ 
ages  of  a  storm,  are  added  the  torrents 
of  rain,  —  “The  heavens  dropped;” 
“  The  clouds  dropped  water ;  ”  “A 
“  plentiful  rain  ;  ”  “  Violent  rain.”  A 
like  description  occurs  in  Hab.  iii.  3- 
11.  Compare  Ps.  xviii.  7-16;  xxix. 
3-9. 

2  Ps.  lxxxi.  7. 


168 


SINAI  AND  THE  LAW. 


Lect.  VII. 


I.  This  was  the  first  and  chief  impression,  which 
Negative  the  Israelites  and  their  leader  alike  were  in- 

Revelation  .  . 

of  Sinai,  tended  to  receive  at  Mount  Sinai.  they  saw 
not  God;  and  yet  they  were  to  believe  that  He  was 
there.  They  were  to  make  no  sign  or  likeness  of  God, 
and  yet  they  were  to  believe  that  He  was  then  and 
always  their  one  and  only  Lord. 

How  hard  it  was  for  them  to  receive  and  act  on 
this,  may  be  imagined  from  what  has  been  said  of 
their  previous  state — may  be  seen  from  their  subse¬ 
quent  history.  Even  on  that  very  plain,  beneath  that 
very  Mount,  they  could  not  bear  to  think  that  they 
were  to  serve  a  God  who  was  invisible ;  they  returned 
to  Egypt  in  their  hearts.  Then  ensued  a  scene  which 
Josephus,  after  the  manner  of  much  Ecclesiastical  His¬ 
tory  of  later  times,  shrinks  from  describing,  but  which 
the  Sacred  historian  does  not  fear  to  relate  at  length. 
Aaron,  the  great  High  Priest,  in  the  absence  of  his 
The  wor-  greater  brother,  was  shaken.  He  framed  a 
Caif.  visible  form,  the  likeness  of  the  sacred  beast 
of  Heliopolis,  and  proclaimed  it  as  “  the  God,1  which 
“  had  brought  them  up  from  the  land  of  Egypt.”  An 
altar  rose  before  it,  like  that  which  still  exists  beneath 
the  nostrils  of  the  Sphinx ;  a  three  days’  festival  was 
proclaimed,  with  all  the  licentious  rites  of  song  and 
dance  which  they  had  learned  in  Egypt.  And  not 
then  only,  but  again  and  again,  both  in  the  history 
of  the  Jewish  and  of  the  Christian  Church,  has  the 
same  temptation  returned.  The  Priest  has  set  up 
what  the  Prophet  has  destroyed.  Graven  images  have 
been  set  up  in  deed  or  in  word,  to  make  the  Unseen 
visible,  and  the  Eternal  temporal.  But  the  Revelation 

1  That  “  Elohim  ”  is  singular  ap-  xxxii.  4,  and  also  from  the  parallel  in 
pears  both  from  the  context  in  Ex.  Neh.  ix.  8. 


Lect.  YII. 


PROPHETIC  MISSION  OF  MOSES. 


169 


of  Sinai  has  prevailed.  Slowly  and  with  many  reverses 
did  the  great  truth  then  first  imparted  gain  possession 
of  the  hearts  of  Israel,  and,  through  them,  of  the 
whole  world,  —  that  we  are  neither  to  imagine  that 
we  see  God  when  we  do  not,  nor  that  because  we  do 
not  see  Him,  are  we  to  doubt  that  He  has  been,  and 
is,  and  yet  shall  be.  This  was  the  marvel  which  the 
Jewish  worship  presented,  even  to  the  best  and  wisest 
heathens  who  were  perplexed  by  what  seemed  to  them 
a  Religion  without  a  God.  It  is  to  us  the  declaration 
that  there  must  be  a  void  created  by  the  destruction 
of  errors,  by  the  removal  of  false  images  of  God, 
before  we  can  receive  the  true  image  of  the  Truth 
itself.1 

II.  But  it  was  not  only  a  negative  form  that  the 
Revelation  of  Sinai  assumed.  This  blank,  this  Positive 
void,  this  darkness  without  a  similitude,  this  of  Sinai, 
vague  infinity,  as  a  heathen  would  have  called  it,  sup¬ 
plied  the  enthusiasm,  the  ardor,  the  practical  basis  of 
life,  which  most  nations  in  the  old  world,  and  many 
in  the  modern  world,  have  believed  to  be  compatible 
only  with  the  most  elaborate  imagery  and  the  most 
definite  statements. 

The  idea  of  God  in  the  Jewish  Church,  which  can 
be  traced  to  nothing  short  of  Mount  Sinai,  was  the 
very  reverse  of  a  negation  or  an  abstraction.  It  was 
the  absorbing  thought  of  the  national  mind.  It  was 
not  merely  the  Lord  of  the  Universe,  but  u  the  Lord 
“  who  had  brought  them  out  of  the  land  of  Egypt, 
“  out  of  the  house  of  bondage.” 2  It  was  in  the  recep¬ 
tion  and  promulgation  of  this  Revelation  that  the  pro- 

1  I  cannot  forbear  to  refer,  for  the  amplification  of  this  idea,  to  Mr. 
Clough’s  remarkable  verses  (Poems,  p.  27.) 

2  Ewald,  Geschichte,  ii.  93-122. 

22 


170 


SINAI  AND  THE  LAW. 


Lect.  VII. 


phetic  character  of  Moses  is  chiefly  brought  out.  He 
had  been  called  to  his  prophetic  mission,  as  we  have 
seen,  in  the  vision  of  the  Burning  Bush.  But  the 
mission  itself,  properly  speaking,  dates  from  this  time, 
and  is  indicated  in  a  form  nearly  corresponding  to 
that  of  his  original  call.  “  I  beseech  Thee,  show  me 
“  Thy  glory,”  was  the  petition  which  burst  from  the 
Prophet  in  the  hour  of  bitter  disappointment  and  iso¬ 
lation,  when  he  found  that  his  brother  and  his  people 
had  fallen  away  from  him.  The  wish  was  thoroughly 
Egyptian.  The  same  is  recorded  of  Amenoph,1  the 
Pharaoh  preceding  the  Exodus.  But  the  difference  in 
the  answer  to  the  two  prayers  well  expresses  the  dif¬ 
ference  between  the  Egyptian  and  the  Mosaic  religion. 
“  Thou  canst  not  see  My  face,  for  there  shall  no  man 
“  see  Me  and  live.”  He  was  commanded  to  hew  two 
blocks  like  those  which  he  had  destroyed.  He  was  to 
come  absolutely  alone.  Even  the  flocks  and  herds 
which  fed  in  the  neighboring  valleys  were  to  be  re¬ 
moved  out  of  sight  of  the  mountain.  He  took  his 
place  on  a  well-known  or  prominent  rock  —  “the” 
rock.2  The  legendary  locality  is  still  shown,  and  the 
importance  of  the  incident,  told  equally  in  the  Bible 
and  the  Koran,3  is  attested  by  the  fact,  that  from  this, 
rather  than  from  any  more  general  connection,  the 
mountain  derives  its  name  of  the  “Mount  of  Moses.” 
It  was  a  moment  of  his  life  second  only  to  that  when  he 
received  the  first  revelation  of  the  Name  of  Jehovah. 
“  The  Lord  passed  by  and  proclaimed,  The  Lord,  the 
“  Lord  God,  merciful  and  gracious,  long-suffering  and 
“  abundant  in  goodness  and  truth,  keeping  mercy  for 

1  Manetho  in  Josephus,  C.  Ap.  i.  26.  3  vii.  139  See  Sinai  and  Palestine , 

2  Exod.  xxxiii.  18,  20,  21  ;  xxxiv.  30. 


Lect.  VII. 


PROPHETIC  MISSION  OF  MOSES. 


171 


“  thousands,  forgiving  iniquity  and  transgression  and 
“sin,  and  that  will  by  no  means  clear  the  guilty.” 
The  union  of  the  qualities,  so  often  disjoined  in  man, 
so  little  thought  of  in  the  gods  of  old,  “justice  and 
“mercy,”  “truth  and  love,”  became  henceforward  the 
formula,  many  times  repeated  —  the  substance  of  the 
Creed  of  the  Jewish  Church.  And  this  union,  which 
was  disclosed  as  the  highest  revelation  to  Moses,  was 
exactly  what  received  its  fullest  exemplification  in  the 
Revelation  for  which  it  was  a  preparation  :  when  in 
the  most  literal  sense  of  the  words,  “  grace  and  truth  ” 
—  the  tenderness  of  grace,  the  sternness  and  justice 
of  truth  —  “  came  by  Jesus  Christ.” 

How  marked  an  epoch  is  thus  intended  appears  from 
the  mode  of  the  Divine  manifestations,  which  Prophetic 

.  mission  of 

are  described  as  commencing  at  this  juncture,  Moses, 
and  perpetuated  with  more  or  less  continuity  through 
the  rest  of  his  career.  Immediately  after  the  catas¬ 
trophe  of  the  worship  of  the  calf,  and,  apparently  in 
consequence  of  it,  Moses  removed  the  chief  tent  —  his 
own  tent,  according  to  the  Septuagint 1  —  outside  the 
camp,  and  invested  it  with  a  sacred  character  under 
the  name  of  “  the  Tent  or  Tabernacle  of  the  Con¬ 
gregation.”  This  tent  became  henceforth  the  chief 
scene  of  his  communications  with  God.  He  left  the 
camp,  and  it  is  described  how,  as  in  the  expectation 
of  some  great  event,  all  the  people  rose  up  and  stood 
every  man  at  his  tent-door,  and  looked  —  gazing  after 
Moses  until  he  disappeared  within  the  Tabernacle. 
As  he  disappeared,  the  entrance  was  closed  behind 
him  by  the  cloudy  pillar,  at  the  sight  of  which  the 
people  prostrated  themselves.2  The  communications 
within  the  Tabernacle  were  still  more  intimate  than 


Exod.  xxxiii.  7,  Ewald,  Alterthiimer,  p.  329. 


2  Exod.  xxxiii.  10. 


1 


172 


SINAI  AND  THE  LAW. 


Lect.  YII. 


those  on  the  mountain.  “  Jehovah  spake  unto  Moses 
u  face  to  face,  as  a  man  speaketh  unto  his  friend” 1 
He  was  apparently  accompanied  on  these  mysterious 
visits  by  his  attendant  Hoshea  (or  Joshua),  who  re¬ 
mained  in  the  Tabernacle  after  his  master  had  left 
it.2 

It  was  during  these  Prophetic  visions  that  a  pecu¬ 
liarity  is  mentioned  which  apparently  had  not  been 
seen  before.  It  was  on  his  final  descent  from  Mount 
Sinai,  after  his  second  long  seclusion,  that  a  splendor 
shone  on  his  face,  as  if  from  the  glory  of  the  Divine 
Presence ; 3  which  gradually  faded  away,  till,  conceal¬ 
ing  its  extinction  by  a  veil,  he  returned  to  the  Divine 
Presence,  once  more  to  rekindle  it  there.  It  is  from 
this  incident,  that,  by  no  very  remote  analogy,  the 
Apostle  draws  the  contrast  between  the  fearlessness, 
the  openness,  of  the  New  Dispensation,  and  the  con¬ 
cealment  and  doubtfulness  of  the  Old.  “fe  have 
“  no  fear,  as  Moses  had,  that  our  glory  will  pass 
u  away.” 

It  is  only  by  thus  looking  forwards  to  the  end,  that 
we  see  the  full  importance  of  the  Prophetic  Mission 
of  Moses.  But  it  is  only  by  looking  back  to  the 


1  Exod.  xxxiii.  11. 

2  Ibid. 

3  It  is  from  the  Vulgate  trans¬ 
lation  of  Jceren  —  “  cornutam  habens 
faciem,”  that  the  Western  Church  has 
adopted  the  conventional  representa¬ 
tion  of  the  horns  of  Moses.  In  the 
English  and  most  Protestant  transla¬ 
tions,  Moses  is  said  to  wear  a  veil 
in  order  to  hide  the  splendor.  In 
order  to  produce  this  sense,  the  Au¬ 
thorized  Version  reads,  Exod.  xxxiv. 
83,  “  And  [till]  Moses  had  done  speak¬ 
ing  with  them ;  ”  and  other  versions, 


“  he  had  put  on  the  veil.”  But  in  the 
Vulgate  and  Septuagint,  he  is  said  to 
put  on  the  veil,  not  during,  but  after, 
the  conversation  with  the  people, — 
in  order  to  hide,  not  the  splendor,  but 
the  vanishing  away  of  the  splendor, 
and  to  have  worn  it  till  the  moment 
of  his  return  to  the  Divine  Presence, 
in  order  to  rekindle  the  light  there. 
With  this  reading  agrees  the  obvious 
meaning  of  the  Hebrew  words,  and  it 
is  this  rendering  of  the  sense,  which  is 
followed  by  St.  Paul  in  2  Cor.  iii.  13, 
14. 


Lect.  VII. 


SILENCE  ON  THE  FUTURE  LIFE. 


ITS 


beginning,  that  we  understand  its  peculiar  signifi¬ 
cance. 

That  the  consciousness  of  a  present  Ruler,  in  the 
closest  moral  relation  with  man,  as  above  described, 
was  a  part  of  the  Mosaic  Revelation,  properly  so 
called,  —  that  it  had  its  origin  in  the  solitudes  of 
Sinai,  and  not  in  any  later  growth  of  the  people  of 
Israel,  —  seem  proved  by  the  place  which  it  holds  as 
the  basis  of  their  most  striking  peculiarities.  Two 
may  be  selected  as  illustrations  of  this  position. 

First,  the  Jewish  religion  is  characterized  in  an 
eminent  degree  by  the  dimness  of  its  concep-  Absence  0f 
tion  of  a  future  life.  From  time  to  time  there  future11 
are  glimpses  of  the  hope  of  immortality.  But llfe* 
for  the  most  part,  it  is  in  the  present  life  that  the 
faith  of  the  Israelite  finds  its  full  accomplishment. 
“  The  grave  cannot  praise  thee ;  death  cannot  cele- 
“  brate  thee,  .  .  .  the  living,  the  living,  he  shall  praise 
“  thee,  as  I  do  this  day.” 1 

It  is  needless  to  repeat  here  the  elaborate  contrast 
drawn  out  by  Bishop  Warburton  in  this  respect  be¬ 
tween  the  Jewish  Scriptures  and  the  religions  of 
Paganism.  Nor  need  we  adopt  the  paradoxical  expe¬ 
dient  by  which,  from  this  apparent  defect,  he  infers 
the  Divine  Legation  of  Moses.  But  the  fact  becomes 
of  real  religious  importance,  if  we  trace  the  ground 
on  which  this  silence  respecting  the  Future  state  was 
based.  Not  from  want  of  religion,  but  (if  one  might 
use  the  expression)  from  excess  of  religion,  was  this 
void  left  in  the  Jewish  mind.  The  Future  Life  was 
not  denied  or  contradicted,  —  but  it  was  overlooked, 
set  aside,  overshadowed,  by  the  consciousness  of  the 
living,  actual  presence  of  God  Himself.  That  truth, 

1  Isaiah  xxxviii.  18,  19;  Ps.  lxxxviii.  12. 


174 


SINAI  AND  THE  LAW. 


Lect.  VII 


at  least  in  the  limited  conceptions  of  the  youthful 
nation,  was  too  vast  to  admit  of  any  rival  truth, 
however  precious.  When  David  or  Hezekiah,  as  in 
the  passages  just  quoted,  shrank  from  the  gloomy 
vacancy  of  the  grave,  it  was  because  they  feared  lest, 
when  death  closed  their  eyes  on  the  present  world, 
they  should  lose  their  hold1  on  that  Divine  Friend, 
with  whose  being  and  communion  the  present  world 
had  in  their  minds  been  so  closely  interwoven.  Such 
a  sense  of  the  overwhelming  greatness  and  nearness 
of  God,  the  root  of  feelings  so  peculiar  as  those  which 
I  have  described,  must  have  lain  too  deep  in  the 
national  belief  to  have  had  its  beginning  in  any  later 
time  than  the  epoch  of  Moses.  It  is  the  primary 
stratification  of  the  Religion.  We  should  invert  the 
whole  order  of  the  nation,  if  we  placed  it  amongst 
the  secondary  formations  of  subsequent  ages. 

Secondly,  it  is  to  this  period  that  we  must  refer  in 
The  Theoc-  its  full  extent,  in  its  most  literal  meaning, 
racy-  what  is  often  called  the  Theocracy  of  the 

Jewish  people.  The  word  is  derived  from  Josephus’s 
account  of  this  time.  He,  as  it  would  seem,  invented 
the  phrase  to  express  an  idea  for  which  ordinary 
Greek  could  furnish  no  adequate  term.  “Our  law¬ 
giver,”  he  says,2  “had  no  regard  to  monarchies,  oli¬ 
garchies,  democracies,  or  any  of  those  forms ;  but  he 
ordained  our  government  to  be  what  by  a  forced  ex¬ 
pression  may  be  called  ‘a  Theocracy?  ”  It  is  a  term 
which  has  been  often  employed  since  ;  usually  in  the 
sense  of  a  sacerdotal  rule,  which  is  almost  exactly  the 
reverse  of  that  in  which  it  was  used  by  its  first  in¬ 
ventor.  The  “Theocracy”  of  Moses  was  not  a  gov¬ 
ernment  by  priests,  as  opposed  to  kings;  it  was  a 

1  Ewald,  Geschichte,  ii.  121.  2  C.  Apion,  ii.  17. 


Lect.  VII. 


THE  THEOCRACY. 


175 


government  by  God  Himself,  as  opposed  to  the  gov¬ 
ernment  by  priests  or  kings.  It  was,  indeed,  Religious 

•  t  •  i  ,  ip,  -l  •  equality  of 

m  its  highest  sense,  as  appeared  aiterwards  m  the  nation, 
the  time  of  David,  compatible  both  with  regal  and 
sacerdotal  rule ;  but,  in  the  first  instance,  it  excluded 
all  rule,  except  the  simplest  forms  which  the  freedom 
of  desert  life  could  furnish.  The  assembly  of  all  the 
tribes  in  the  armed  congregation,  the  chieftains  or 
elders  of  the  various  tribes  as  established  by  Jethro, 
were  the  constituent  elements  of  the  primitive  He¬ 
brew  commonwealth,  in  its  ordinary  social  relations. 
But  in  its  highest  aspect,  it  was  distinguished  from 
the  other  nations  of  antiquity  by  its  comparative  ab¬ 
sence  of  caste,  by  its  equality  of  religious  relations. 
An  hereditary  priesthood,  it  is  true,  was  established, 
after  the  manner  of  Egypt,  in  the  tribe  of  Levi,  in 
the  family  of  Aaron.  But  it  was  a  subse-  Subordina- 
quent3  appendage  to  the  fundamental  pre-  priesthood. 


1  Some  eminent  divines  have  sup¬ 
posed  that  the  Levitical  ritual  was  an 
after-growth  of  the  Mosaic  system, 
necessitated  or  suggested  by  the  in¬ 
capacity  of  the  Israelites  to  retain  the 
higher  and  simpler  doctrine  of  the 
Divine  Unity,  —  as  proved  by  their 
return  to  the  worship  of  the  Helio- 
politan  calf  under  the  sanction  of  the 
brother  of  Moses  himself.  There  is 
no  direct  statement  of  this  connection 
in  the  sacred  narrative :  but  there  are 
indirect  indications  of  it,  sufficient  to 
give  some  color  to  such  an  explanation. 
The  event  itself,  as  we  have  seen,  is 
described  as  a  crisis  in  the  life  of  Moses, 
almost  equal  to  that  in  which  he  re¬ 
ceived  his  first  call.  In  an  agony  of 
vexation  and  disappointment  he  de¬ 
stroyed  the  monument  of  his  first  rev¬ 
elation  (Ex.  xxxiv.  19).  He  threw 


up  his  sacred  mission  ( ib .  32).  He 
craved  and  he  received  a  new  and 
special  revelation  of  the  attributes  of 
God  to  console  him  (ib.  xxxiii.  18).  A 
fresh  start  was  made  in  his  career  (ib. 
xxxiv.  29).  His  relation  with  his  coun¬ 
trymen  henceforth  became  more  awful 
and  mysterious  (ib.  32-35).  In  point 
of  fact,  the  greater  part  of  the  details 
of  the  Levitical  system  were  subse¬ 
quent  to  this  catastrophe.  The  insti¬ 
tution  of  the  Levitical  tribe  grew  di¬ 
rectly  out  of  it  (ib.  xxxii.  28).  And 
the  inferiority  of  this  part  of  the  sys¬ 
tem  to  the  rest  is  expressly  stated  in 
the  Prophets,  and  expressly  connected 
with  the  idolatrous  tendencies  of  the 
nation  —  “  Wherefore  I  gave  them 
“  statutes  that  were  not  good,  and 
“  judgments  whereby  they  should  not 
“  live  ”  (Ezek.  xx.  25). 


176 


SINAI  AND  THE  LAW. 


lect.  vn. 


cepts,  to  the  first  declaration  of  the  religion :  in  its 
hereditary  functions,  in  its  sacred  dress,  in  its  minute 
regulations,  rather  a  part  of  the  mechanism  of  the 
religion,  than  its  animating  spirit.  The  Levitical  caste 
never  corresponded  to  what  we  should  call  “  the 
clergy.”  The  fact  that  the  Levites  were  collected  in 
single  cities  is  of  itself  a  fatal  objection  to  so  regard¬ 
ing  them.1  They  never  claimed  or  were  intended  to 
govern  the  nation.  They  hardly  claimed  even  to 
teach.  Levi  was  not  the  ruling  tribe,  even  though 
the  two  great  leaders  belonged  to  it;  its  consecration 
dated  from  no  essential  ordinance  of  the  Law,  but 
from  the  sudden  emergency  which  arose  out  of  the 
apostasy  at  the  time  of  the  molten  calf.  Aaron, 
though  the  head  of  that  tribe,  and  the  founder  of 
the  sacerdotal  family,  was  not  the  ruling  spirit  of  the 
people.  He  was  but  the  weaker  erring  helpmate  of 
Moses,  who  was  the  Guide,  the  Prophet,  but  not  the 
Priest. 

\ 

We  shall  see  how,  like  the  equality  of  the  primi¬ 
tive  Christian  Church,  this  first  development  of  Israel¬ 
ite  independence  gradually  passed  into  other  forms,  — 
to  what  disorders  it  gave  rise  when  every  man  did 
what  was  right  in  his  own  eyes,  and  there  was  no 
king  in  Israel;  how,  as  in  the  case  of  the  Christian 
Church  of  later  times,  all  the  complicated  relations 
of  state  and  of  hierarchy  afterwards  sprang  up  within 
the  framework  of  a  society  at  its  beginning  so  simple. 
But  the  twin  truths,  which  seem  incorporated  with 
the  very  localities  of  Sinai,  —  the  Unseen  Ruler  in  the 
thick  clouds  on  the  top  of  the  awful  Mountain,  and 
the  sacredness  of  the  whole  congregation  as  it  lay 
spread  over  the  level  Plain  beneath,  —  were  never  lost 

1  Michaelis,  Laws  of  Moses ,  art.  52. 


Lect.  VII. 


THE  THEOCRACY. 


177 


to  the  Jewish  Church,  and  have  been  the  constant 
springs  of  religious  freedom  and  responsibility  to  the 
Christian  Church.  Even  at  the  very  outset  of  the 
Revelation  was  announced  the  great  principle  —  the 
Gospel,  as  it  has  been  well  called,1  of  the  Mosaic  dis¬ 
pensation —  so  new  to  the  nation  of  slaves,  who  had 
hitherto  seen  truth  only  through  the  long  vista  of 
mystical  emblems  and  sacred  incorporations.  “Thus 
“  shalt  thou  say  to  the  house  of  Jacob,  and  tell  the 
“  children  of  Israel ;  Ye  have  seen  what  I  did.  to  the 
“  Egyptians,  and  how  I  bare  you  on  eagles’  wings, 
“  and  brought  you  unto  Myself.  Now  therefore,  if 
“  ye  will  obey  My  voice  indeed,  and  keep  My  cove- 
“  nant,  then  shall  ye  be  a  peculiar  treasure  unto  Me 
“  above  all  people ;  for  all  the  earth  is  Mine.  And  ye 
“  shall  be  unto  me  a  kingdom  of  priests,  and  a  holy 
“nation.”2  “Ye  shall  be  holy,  for  I  am  holy.”3 

Inspiration,  communion  with  God,  in  the  case  of  the 
Pagan  religions,  was  for  the  most  part  con-  Universal_ 
fined  to  sacred  families  or  local  oracles ;  in  poetic 
the  case  of  the  Mussulman  religion,  was  con-  insPiration- 
fined  to  its  first  founder  and  his  sacred  volume.  But 
in  the  case  of  Israel  it  extended  to  the  whole  nation. 
The  history  of  Israel,  from  Moses  downwards,  is  not 
the  history  of  an  inspired  book  or  an  inspired  order, 
but  of  an  inspired  people.  When  Joshua,  in  his 
youthful  zeal,  entreated  Moses  to  forbid  the  prophe¬ 
sying  of  Eldad  and  Medad,  because  they  remained  in 
the  camp,  Moses  answered :  “  Enviest  thou  for  my 
“  sake  ?  Would  that  all  the  Lord’s  people  were  proph- 
“  ets,  and  that  the  Lord  would  put  His  Spirit  upon 
“them!”4  In  different  forms  and  in  different  degrees 

1  Ewald,  Geschichte ,  ii.  126.  3  Lev.  xix.  2. 

2  Ex.  xix.  3-6.  4  Num.  xi.  26—30. 

23 


178 


SINAI  AND  THE  LAW. 


Lect.  YU 


that  noble  wish  was  fulfilled.  The  acts  of  the  hero, 
the  songs  of  the  poet,  the  skill  of  the  artificer, — • 
Samson’s  strength,  the  music  of  David,  the  architect¬ 
ure  of  Bezaleel  and  Solomon,  are  all  ascribed  to  the 
inspiration  of  the  Divine  Spirit.  It  was  not  a  holy 
tribe,  but  holy  men  of  every  tribe  that  spake  as  they 
were  moved,  carried  to  and  fro,  out  of  themselves, 
by  the  Spirit  of  God.  The  Prophets,  of  whom  this 
might  be  said  in  the  strictest  sense,  were  confined  to 
no  family  or  caste,  station  or  sex.  They  rose,  indeed, 
above  their  countrymen,  their  words  were  to  their 
countrymen,  in  a  peculiar  sense,  the  words  of  God. 
But  they  were  to  be  found  everywhere.  Like  the 
springs  of  their  own  land,  there  was  no  hill  or  valley 
where  the  prophetic  gift  might  not  be  expected  to 
break  forth.  Miriam  and  Deborah,  no  less  than  Moses 
and  Barak;  in  Judah  and  in  Ephraim,  no  less  than  in 
Levi ;  in  Tekoah  and  Tishbe,  and,  as  the  climax  of  all, 
in  Nazareth,  no  less  than  in  Shiloh  or  Jerusalem, 
God’s  present  counsel  might  be  looked  for.  By  this 
constant  attitude  of  expectation,  if  one  may  so  call  it, 
the  ears  of  the  whole  nation  were  kept  open  for  the 
intimations  of  the  Divine  Ruler  under  whom  they 
lived.  None  knew  beforehand  who  would  be  called. 
As  Strabo  well  says,  in  his  description  of  the  Mosaic 
dispensation  which  I  have  before  quoted,  “all  might 
“  expect  to  receive  the  gift  of  good  dreams  ”  for 
themselves  or  their  people,  “  all  who  lived  temper¬ 
ately  and  justly,  —  those  always  and  those  only.” 
In  the  dead  of  night,  as  to  Samuel ;  in  the  plough¬ 
ing  of  the  field,  as  to  Elisha ;  in  the  gathering  of  the 
sycamore  figs,  as  to  Amos ;  the  call  might  come. 
“  Speak,  Lord,  for  thy  servant  heareth,”  was  to  be 
the  ready  and  constant  answer.  And  thus,  even  in 


lect.  vn. 


THE  THEOCRACY 


179 


its  first  establishment,  the  Theocracy,  in  its  true 
sense,  contained  the  warrant  for  its  complete  develop¬ 
ment.  Moses  was  but  the  beginning ;  he  was  not,  he 
could  not  be  the  end.  The  light  on  his  countenance 
faded  away,  and  had  to  be  again  and  again  rekindled 
in  the  presence  of  the  Unseen.  But  his  appearance, 
his  character,  his  teaching,  accustomed,  familiarized 
the  nation  to  this  mode  of  revelation ;  and  it  would 
be  at  their  peril,  and  against  the  whole  spirit  of  the 
education  received  from  him,  if  they  refused  to  re¬ 
ceive  its  later  manifestations,  from  whatever  quar¬ 
ter.  "  The  Lord  thy  God  will  raise  up  unto  thee  a 
“  Prophet ,  from  the  midst  of  thee,  of  thy  brethren ,  like 
“ unto  me.  Unto  him  shall  ye  hearken”  The  same 
event,  it  has  been  truly  remarked,  never  repeats  it- 
self  in  history.  Yet  a  like  event  in  one  age  is  al¬ 
ways  a  preparation  for  a  like  event  in  another,  es¬ 
pecially  when  the  first  event  is  one  which  involves 
the  principle  of  the  second.  Moses,  —  the  expounder 
of  the  Theocracy,  the  founder  of  the  Hebrew  Proph¬ 
ets,  the  interpreter  between  God  on  Mount  Sinai 
and  Israel  in  the  plain  below,  was  the  necessary  fore¬ 
runner,  because  the  imperfect  likeness,  of  the  Last 
Prophet  of  the  last  generation  of  the  Jewish  theoc¬ 
racy.  In  the  fullest  sense  might  it  be  said  to  that 
generation :  "  There  is  one  that  accuseth  you ,  even  Moses , 
“in  whom  ye  trust ;  for  had  ye  believed  Moses ,  ye  ivoidd 
“ have  believed  Me;  bid  if  ye  believe  not  his  writings ,  how 
“  will  ye  believe  My  words  ?  ” 1 

III.  There  was  another  point  in  the  Kevelation  of 
Sinai  not  less  permanent,  and  equally  charac-  The  Law. 
teristic.  We  speak  of  it  as  a  revelation  of  "Religion.” 
But  this  was  not  the  name  by  which  it  was  known 

1  John  v.  45-47. 


I 


180  SINAI  AND  THE  LAW.  Lect.  VII, 

in  ancient  times.  The  Israelite  spoke  not  -of  the 
u  Religion  ”  but  of  the  “  Law  ”  of  Moses.  Moses  was 
a  Lawgiver1  even  more  than  he  was  a  Prophet.  In 
this  aspect  the  Revelation  presented  itself,  and  from 
this  were  derived  some  of  its  most  important  features. 
At  first  sight  it  might  appear  as  if  “  the  Law  ”  was 
not  the  form  of  truth  for  which  the  wild  desert  and 
the  return  to  the  wandering  Arab  life  would  have 
predisposed  them;  and  as  regards  the  minuteness  of 
many  of  the  enactments,  Egypt,  as  I  have  before  ob¬ 
served,  and  not  Sinai,  must  be  considered  the  fitting 
school  of  preparation.  But  those  who  have  studied 
the  Bedouin  tribes  know  that  there  is  no  contradic¬ 
tion  between  their  wild  habits  and  an  elaborate 
though  purely  traditional  system  of  social  and  legal 
observances.  Such  a  system  has  been  carefully  col¬ 
lected  and  expounded  by  the  traveller  Burckhardt, 
who  thus  closes  the  first  portion  of  his  remarkable 
work:  “The  present  state  of  the  great  Bedouin  com- 
“  monwealth  of  Arabia  .  .  offers  the  rare  example  of 
“  a  nation  which,  notwithstanding  its  perpetual  state 
“  of  warfare,  without  and  within,  has  preserved,  for  a 
u  long  succession  of  ages,  its  primitive  laws  in  all  their 
“  vigor.  .  .  .  But,”  he  adds,  “  of  the  origin  of  these 
“  laws  nothing  is  known.  .  .  .  The  ancient  code  of 
“  one  Bedouin  tribe  only  has  reached  posterity.  .  .  . 
“  The  Pentateuch  was  exclusively  given  to  the  Beni- 
“  Israel.” 2 

It  is  this  code  of  the  Beni-Israel,  —  the  “  sons  of 
Israel,”  (the  name  itself  is  an  enduring  mark  of  their 
first  Patriarchal  state,)  —  this  one  extant  code  of  an 
ancient  Bedouin  tribe,  which,  bearing  in  mind  this 

1  He  is  twice  so  called  in  the  Pen-  2  Notes  on  the  Bedouins ,  i.  381. 

tateuch,  Num.  xxi.  18;  Deut.  xxxiii. 

21. 


Lect.  VII. 


THE  LAW  IN  THE  DESERT 


181 


peculiarity  of  its  first  appearance,  we  have  now  to 
examine.  Here,  as  elsewhere,  it  is  only  by  remem¬ 
bering  what  there  was  immediate,  historical,  and  local, 
that  we  shall  be  able  fully  to  appreciate  what  there 
is  of  eternal  and  universal. 

It  has  been  a  question  often  debated  amongst 
scholars,  how  far  the  code  of  the  Pentateuch  was  a 
collection  of  earlier,  later,  or  contemporaneous  cus¬ 
toms,  under  one  general  system.  It  will  here  suffice 
to  name  those  portions  of  the  Law  which,  by  direct 
connection  with  the  life  of  the  Desert,  can  be  traced 
back  to  the  Sinai  tic  period. 

1.  There  is  no  express  enactment  of  any  form  of 
government  in  the  Mosaic  Law.  But  the  Constitution 

°  of  the 

elders  or  chiefs  of  the  tribes,  who  appear  as  Desert, 
the  background  of  the  primitive  constitution,  are  dis¬ 
tinctly  Arabian,  and  in  part  existed  before  the  Exo¬ 
dus,1  in  part,  at  least,  may  be  ascribed  to  Jethro. 
The  word  is  almost  identical  with  the  “  Sheik” 2  of 
modern  times,  and  is  the  same  which  designates  the 
chiefs  of  the  Bedouin  tribes  of  Midian.  Their  original 
names  are  preserved.3  Together  they  formed  a  coun¬ 
cil  of  seventy,  of  which,  as  it  would  seem,  Hur  was 
the  head.4  They  were  chosen  by  the  people,  and 
dedicated  by  Moses.  The  priests  were  not  part  of 
them.5  Through  all  the  changes  of  the  office,  the 
name  still  continued.  From  time  to  time  it  appears 
in  the  settled  period  of  the  monarchy.6  On  the  dis¬ 
solution  of  the  kingdom  it  reasserts  something  of  its 
original  importance.7  Out  of  the  elders  or  ■  Sheiks  of 

1  Ex.  iv>  29.  5  2  Chron.  xxxi.  2. 

-  Zakin,  Num.  xxii.  4  ;  see  Gese-  *>  For  instance,  1  Ks.  viii.  1 ;  2  Ks. 
nius,  sub  voce.  xxiii.  1. 

3  Num.  ii.  3-29;  x.  14-27.  7  jer.  xxix.  2;  Ezek.  viii.  11,  12; 

4  Num.  xi. ;  Ex.  xxiv.  9,  14.  1  Mac.  xii.  1,  35. 


182 


SINAI  AND  THE  LAW. 


Lect.  VII 


the  desert  thus  grew  the  elders  of  the  synagogues; 
and  out  of  the  elders  of  the  synagogues,  —  with  no 
change  of  name  except  that  which  took  place  in 
passing  from  Hebrew  to  Greek  and  from  Greek  to 
the  languages  of  modern  Europe,  —  the  “  Presbyters/' 
“Prestres,”  and  “  Priests”  of  Christendom.  That  word 
and  that  office,  so  limited  in  its  present  meaning,  is 
the  direct  descendant  of  the  rudest  and  most  primi¬ 
tive  forms  of  the  Jewish  nation.  The  Christian  Pres- 

\ 

byter  represents,  not  the  high  priest  Aaron,  but  the 
Bedouin  Jethro,  —  not  the  sacerdotal,  but  the  primi¬ 
tive  element  of  the  ancient  Church. 

2.  The  Encampment  and  its  movements  were  pe- 
Encamp-  culiar  to  the  desert.  Never  again,  after  the 
ment.  first  settlement  in  Canaan,  could  the  sight 
have  been  conceived  of  the  detailed  arrangements 
which  called  forth  the  passionate  burst  of  Balaam’s 
admiration :  “  How  goodly  are  thy  tents,  0  Jacob, 
“  and  thy  tabernacles,  0  Israel !  ”  Many  usages  men¬ 
tioned  in  connection  with  it  must  have  perished  at 
once  on  their  entrance  into  settled  life.  But  relics 
of  such  a  state  are  long  to  be  traced  both  in  their 
language  and  in  their  monuments.  The  very  words 
“  camp  ”  and  “  tents  ”  remained  long  after  they  had 
ceased  to  be  literally  applicable.  “  The  tents  of  the 
“  Lord  ”  were  in  the  precincts  of  the  Temple.  The 
cry  of  sedition,  evidently  handed  down  from  ancient 
times,  was,  “To  your  tents,  0  Israel.”  “Without  the 
“  camp  ” 1  was  the  expression  applied  even  to  the  very 
latest  events  of  Jerusalem.  In  like  manner,  the  na¬ 
tional  war-cries,  always  the  oldest  of  national  com¬ 
positions,  go  back  to  this  early  state.  The  shout, 
“  Rise  up,  0  Lord,  and  let  Thine  enemies  be  scattered ; 


1  Heb.  xiii.  13. 


Lect.  VII. 


RELICS  OF  THE  WANDERINGS. 


183 


“  let  them  also  that  hate  thee  flee  before  Thee,”  was 
incorporated  into  the  Psalms  of  the  monarchy ;  but  its 
first  force  came  from  the  time  when,  morning  by 
morning,  it  was  repeated  as  the  ark  was  slowly  and 
solemnly  raised  on  the  shoulders  of  the  Levites,  and 
went  forth  against  the  enemies  of  God  in  the  desert.1 
“  Arise,  0  Lord,  into  Thy  resting  place  !  Thou  and  the 
“  ark  of  Thy  strength.”  “  Give  ear,  0  Shepherd  of 
“  Israel,  Thou  that  leadest  Joseph  like  a  flock ;  Thou 
“  that  dwellest  between  the  cherubim,  shine  forth ! 
“Before  Ephraim,  Benjamin  and  Manasseh,  stir  up 
“  Thy  strength  and  come  and  help  us  .” 2  Grand  and 
touching  as  is  this  address,  taken  in  its  application  to 
the  latest  decline  of  the  Jewish  kingdom,  it  is  still 
more  so,  when  we  see  in  it  the  reflected  image  of 
the  order  of  the  ancient  march,  when  the  ark  of  God 
went  forth,  the  pillar  of  fire  shining  high  above  it, 
surrounded  by  the  armed  Levites,  its  rear  guarded 
by  the  warrior  tribes  of  Ephraim,  Benjamin,  and  Ma¬ 
nasseh,  the  brother  and  the  sons  of  Joseph,  doubtless 
intrusted  with  the  embalmed  remains  of  their  mighty 
ancestor. 

And  if  from  these  fragments  of  sacred  speech  we 
look  at  the  actual  relics  of  antiquity  (in  the  literal 
sense  of  relics),  their  desert  lineage  is  still  more  indis¬ 
putable. 

Down  to  the  latest  times  of  the  monarchy  was  pre¬ 
served,  in  the  innermost  sanctuary  of  the  The  Ark. 
Temple,  the  ancient  ark  or  coffer  of  wood,  purporting 
to  be  the  same  which  had  been  made  at  Mount  Sinai 
and  carried  through  all  their  wanderings.  Its  form, 
as  we  have  seen,  possibly  its  religious  significance, 
was  derived  from  Egypt.  But  its  material  was  such 

1  Num.  x.  35,  36 ;  Ps.  lxviii.  1.  2  ps.  Ixxx.  1  ;  Ps.  cxxxii.  8. 


184 


SINAI  AND  THE  LAW. 


Lect.  YH. 


as  can  hardly  be  explained,  except  by  the  account 
given  of  its  first  appearance.  It  was  not  of  oak,  the 
usual  wood  of  Palestine,  nor  of  cedar,1  the  usual  wood 
employed  in  Palestine  for  sacred  purposes,  but  of 
shittim  or  acacia,  a  tree  of  rare  growth  in  Syria,  but 
the  most  frequent,  not  even  excepting  the  palm,  in 
the  Peninsula  of  Sinai. 

What  lay  within  the  Ark,  also  of  this  period,  shall 
be  mentioned  hereafter.  Two  lesser  objects  of  in¬ 
terest  were  laid  up,  we  know  not  for  how  long  a 
time,  in  front  of  it,  both  relics  of  Sinai.  One  was  the 
The  pot  of  pot  of  manna.  Many  a  perplexed  controversy 
1  on  the  nature  of  the  food  which  sustained 

the  Israelites  in  the  desert  would  have  been  spared, 
could  we  have  but  caught  one  glance  at  this  its 
authentic  perpetuation.  It  has  been  conjectured  by 
Reland,  (and,  in  a  matter  of  such  obscurity,  even  the 
conjecture  of  so  great  a  scholar  may  be  worth  notice,) 
that  the  existence  of  this  vessel,  with  the  handles  or 
ears  by  which  it  was  supported,  may  have  lent  a 
pretext  to  the  strange  fable  already  quoted  from 
Tacitus,  that  the  Jewish  sanctuary  contained  the 
figure  of  an  ass’s  head,  in  commemoration  of  the 
events  in  the  wilderness.  Another  object  which  lay 

The  staff  beside  the  vessel  of  manna  was  the  staff  or 
of  Aaron.  roq  0p  aimond  wood,  —  the  sceptre  of  the  tribe 

of  Levi,  —  sometimes  borne  by  Moses,2  sometimes  by 
Aaron,  the  emblem  of  the  ancient  shepherd  life,  when 
sceptre  and  crook  were  one  and  the  same.  The  like 


1  Rabbinical  writers,  in  their  igno-  the  desert,  we  must,  as  was  observed 
ranee,  interpret  sliittim  as  “  cedar.”  in  Lecture  VI.,  exchange  the  histor- 
If  we  translate  shittim  as  “  cedar,”  ical  ground  of  the  narrative  for  two 
and  tachash  (vide  infra )  as  “  badg-  imaginary  miracles, 
er,”  neither  of  which  are  found  in  2  See  Num.  xvii.  6 ;  xx.  8-10. 


Lect.  VII. 


RELICS  OF  THE  WANDERINGS. 


185 


staff  is  still  carried  by  the  present  chiefs  of  the  Sina 
itic  Peninsula. 

But  the  most  remarkable  vestige  of  the  nomadic 
state  of  the  nation  was  the  Tabernacle  or  The  Taber_ 
Tent,  which  was  the  shelter  of  the  Ark  long  nacle‘ 
after  the  entrance  into  Canaan,  and  which  was  finally 
laid  aside  and  treasured  up  in  the  chambers  of  the 
Temple,  when  the  erection  of  that  stately  building 
rendered  its  further  use  superfluous.  The  Temple  it¬ 
self  was  in  some  important  respects  but  a  permanent 
and  enlarged  copy  of  the  Tabernacle.  The  name  of 
the  Sacred  Tent  was  thus  used  for  the  Temple  long 
after  it  had  itself  been  discontinued.1  In  these  its 
later  imitations  and  reminiscences,  much  more  whilst 
it  stood  as  the  one  Sanctuary  of  the  nation,  it  was  a 
constant  memorial  of  the  wandering  state,  in  which 
they  received  their  earliest  forms  of  architecture  and 
of  worship.  No  Gothic  or  Byzantine  style  can  reveal 
to  us  more  clearly  the  dates  of  the  churches  and 
cathedrals  of  modern  Europe,  than  those  rough  boards 
of  acacia  wood,  those  coarse  tent-cloths  of  goat’s-hair 
and  ram-skin,  dyed  red  after  the  Arabian  fashion,  in¬ 
dicated  the  epoch  of  the  primitive  Jewish  sanctuary. 
Not  a  Druidical  cromlech,  like  the  Patriarchal  Bethel, 
not  a  fixed  house  like  the  palatial  structures  of  Pha¬ 
raoh  or  of  Solomon,  but  a  tent,  distinguished  only  by 
its  larger  dimensions  and  more  costly  materials  from 
the  rest  of  the  Israelite  encampment,  was  “  the  Taber- 
“  nacle  of  the  Lord  which  Moses  made  in  the  wilder- 
“  ness.”  On  this  simple  dwelling,  as  of  the  Unseen 
Chief  and  Ruler  of  the  host,  was  lavished  all  the  art 
and  treasure  that  the  region  could  supply ;  skins  of 

1  Ezek.  xli.  1  ;  Ps.  lxxvi.  2 ;  lxxxiv.  1  ;  “  a  resemblance  of  the  Holy  Tab¬ 
ernacle.”  Wisdom  ix.  8. 

24 


186 


SINAI  AND  THE  LAW. 


Lect.  VII. 


seals  or  fishes 1  from  the  adjoining  gulfs  of  the  Red  Sea, 
linen  coverings  from  the  Egyptian  spoils,  to  clothe 
the  tent  as  though  it  were  itself  a  living  object, — 
almost  as,  at  the  present  day,  the  sanctuary  of  Mecca 
is  year  by  year  clothed  and  reclothed  with  sumptuous 
velvets,  the  gifts  of  Mussulman  devotion.2  The  names 
of  the  architects  of  the  Temple  of  Solomon  have 
perished,  but  the  names  of  the  builders  of  the  Taber¬ 
nacle, — the  first  founders  of  Jewish  architecture,  the 
rude  beginners  of  Israelite,  and  through  them  of  all 
religious,  Art,  are  emphatically  recorded,  —  Bezaleel, 
the  grandson  of  the  great  but  mysterious  Hur,  and 
his  companion  Aholiab  of  the  tribe  of  Dan.  “  See,  the 
66  Lord  hath  called  by  name  Bezaleel  the  son  of  Uri, 
“  the  son  of  Hur,  of  the  tribe  of  Judah :  and  He  hath 
K  filled  him  with  the  Spirit  of  God,  in  wisdom,  in 
“  understanding,  and  in  knowledge,  and  in  all  manner 
“  of  workmanship ;  and  to  devise  curious  works,  to 
ec  work  in  gold,  and  in  silver,  and  in  brass,  and  in  the 
“  cutting  of  stones  to  set  them,  and  in  carving  of 
“  wood,  to  make  any  manner  of  cunning  work.  And 
“  He  hath  put  in  his  heart  that  he  may  teach,  both 
“  he  and  Aholiab,  the  son  of  Ahisamach,  of  the  tribe 
“  of  Dan.” 3 

3.  Amidst  the  various  elements  of  worship  which 
Sacrifice,  were  to  be  carried  on  in  and  around  the 
tabernacle,  the  most  conspicuous  was,  so  far  as  we 
can  judge,  peculiarly  fitted  to  the  mind  of  an  Ara¬ 
bian  tribe.  We  may  indulge  in  philosophical  or  theo¬ 
logical  speculations  concerning  the  institution  of  Sacri- 

1  Such  is  the  probable  meaning  of  2  Burton’s  Pilgrimage ,  iii.  295. 
the  word  translated  “  badger.”  See  3  Ex.  xxxv.  30-34. 

Gesenius  under  Tachash.  Also  Rob¬ 
inson,  Bib.  Researches ,  i.  116. 


Lect.  VII. 


RELICS  OF  THE  WANDERINGS. 


187 


fice ;  but,  historically  (and  this  is  the  only  point  of 
view  in  which  we  are  now  to  consider  it),  we  cannot 
overlook  its  adaptation  to  the  peculiar  period  of  the 
Israelitish  existence,  in  which  we  find  it  first  de¬ 
scribed  at  length.  Some  of  the  forms  are  identical 
with  those  of  Egypt  and  of  India.  But  it  is  remark 
able  that  the  institution  (taken  in  its  most  general 
aspect),  after  having  perished  everywhere  else  among 
the  worshippers  of  One  God,  still  lingers  among  that 
portion  of  the  Semitic  nations  which  more  than  any 
other  represent  the  condition  of  Israel  at  Sinai.  Ex¬ 
tinct  almost  entirely  in  the  Jewish  race  itself,  it  is 
still  an  important  part  of  the  worship  of  the  Bedouin 
Arabs.  In  the  desert  of  Sinai  itself,  sacrifice  is  still 
almost  the  only  form  which  Bedouin  religion  takes, 
at  the  chief  sanctuary  of  the  peninsula,  the  tomb  of 
Sheik  Saleh,1  and  on  the  summit  of  Serbal.2  When 
Burckhardt  wished  to  penetrate  into  the  then  inac¬ 
cessible  fastness  of  Petra,  the  pretext  which  afforded 
him  the  greatest  security  was  that  of  professing  a 
desire  to  sacrifice  a  goat  at  the  tomb  of  Aaron.  In 
the  pilgrimage  to  Mecca,  “  the  sacrifices  in  the  valley 
u  of  Muna  are  so  numerous  and  so  intricate,  that  it 
“  is  believed  that  none  but  the  Prophet  knew  them.” 3 
Whatever  difficulty  we  have  in  analyzing  the  feelings 
of  an  ancient  Israelite  in  shedding  the  blood  of  a  bull 
or  a  goat,  or  in  wringing  the  neck  of  a  pigeon  be¬ 
fore  the  altar,  exists  equally  in  the  case  of  the  like 
rites  of  a  modern  Mussulman.  Simple  as  we  may 
suppose  the  religion  of  that  earliest  stage  of  the 

1  Sinai  and  Palestine ,  57.  thrown  over  the  rocks.  Comp,  the 

2  Drew’s  Scripture  Lands ,  61.  A  scapegoat.  (Lev.  xvi.  22.) 

sheep  is  sacrificed  on  the  summit,  and  2  Burton’s  Pilgrimage ,  iii.  226,  303- 

313. 


188 


SINAI  AND  THE  LAW. 


Lect.  YH 


national  life  of  the  Israelites  to  have  been,  Sacrifice 
is,  by  what  we  know  of  the  Arabian  religion,  one 
of  the  most  necessary  forms  which  it  could  have  as¬ 
sumed. 

And  as  the  sacrificial  system  was  one  which  would 
The  tribe  be  specially  understood  and  felt  at  this  early 
ofLevl‘  period,  so  also  historically  did  the  Levitical 
priesthood  spring  from  the  then  existing  framework 
of  events.  The  “tribe”  of  Levi  of  itself  indicates  the 
nomad  division.  It  has  even  down  to  this  day  pre¬ 
served  the  recollection  of  that  division,  when  all 
the  other  like  distinctions  of  the  Jewish  nation  have 
perished.  The  tribe  of  Levi ,  the  family  of  Aaron ,  are 
almost  the  only  permanent  signs  of  the  personal  great¬ 
ness  of  Moses  and  his  brother.  The  supremacy  of 
Israel  was  in  later  times  shifted  from  one  tribe  to 
another,  Ephraim,  Benjamin,  Judah.  But  this  is  the 
only  period  in  which  the  leading  spirits  of  the  nation 
came  from  the  tribe  of  Levi ;  and  in  which,  therefore, 
its  moral  preeminence  gave  a  ground  for  its  ceremonial 
preeminence  also.  Such  a  ground,  implied  doubtless 
in  the  case  of  Aaron,  is  expressly  stated  in  the  case 
of  the  tribe  at  large,  when  we  are  told  that  the 
origin  of  their  consecration  was  to  be  found  in  the 
fierce  zeal  with  which  they  rallied  round  Moses  at  the 
time  of  the  Golden  Calf,  and  66  slew  every  man  his 
“  brother,  and  every  man  his  companion,  and  every 
“  man  his  neighbour.” 1  The  triple  benediction,  the 
especial  function  of  the  sacerdotal  office,  preserved  in 
the  family  till  this  day,  and  commemorated  even  in 
the  triple  division  of  the  fingers,  and  carved  on  the 
gravestones  of  those  who  are  supposed  to  be  Aaron’s 
descendants,  bears  on  its  front  the  marks  of  the 

1  Ex.  xxxii.  27.  Compare  Deut.  xxxiii.  9. 


Lect.  VII. 


RELICS  OF  THE  WANDERINGS. 


189 


primitive  age,  in  which  alone  it  could  have  orig¬ 
inated.1 

4.  The  distinction  between  various  kinds  of  food  is 
one  which  furnished  the  earliest  questions  of  Thedis- 

.  .  ,  .  .  n  tinctions  of 

casuistry  m  the  transition  from  the  J  ewish  to  food, 
the  Christian  Church,  and  which  lingers  in  the  rem¬ 
nants  of  the  Jewish  race  to  this  day.  It  may  be 
difficult  to  account  entirely  for  the  grounds  of  the 
distinction,  but  they  may  be  traced  with  the  greatest 
probability  to  the  peculiarities  of  the  condition  of  Is¬ 
rael  at  the  time  of  the  giving  of  the  Law.  The  ani¬ 
mals  of  which  they  might  freely  eat  were  those 
which  belonged  especially  to  their  pastoral  state, — 
the  ox,  the  sheep,  and  the  goat,  to  which  were  added 
the  various  classes  of  chamois  and  gazelle.  As  we 
read  the  detailed  permission  to  eat  every  class  of 
what  may  be  called  the  game  of  the  wilderness, — 

“  the  wild  goat,  and  the  roe,  and  the  red-deer,  and 

“the  ibex,  and  the  antelope,2  and  the  chamois,”  —  a 

new  aspect  is  suddenly  presented  to  us  of  a  large 

part  of  the  life  of  the  Israelites  in  the  desert.  It 
reveals  them  to  us  as  a  nation  of  hunters;  it  shows 
them  to  us,  clambering  over  the  smooth  rocks,  scal¬ 
ing  the  rugged  pinnacles  of  Sinai,  as  the  Arab  cha¬ 
mois  hunters  of  the  present  day,  with  bows  and  ar¬ 
rows  instead  of'  guns.  Such  pursuits  they  could  only 
in  a  limited  degree  have  followed  in  their  own  coun¬ 
try.  The  permission,  the  perplexity  implied  in  the 
permission,  could  only  have  arisen  in  a  place  where 
the  animals  in  question  abounded.  High  up  on  the 
cliffs  of  Sinai  the  traveller  still  sees  the  herds  of  ga- 

1  Num.  vi.  24.  Compare  the  grave-  2  Its  name,  Dislion ,  is  that  of  the 
stones  in  the  Jewish  cemetery  at  son  of  Seir  (Gen.  xxxvi.  21,  30). 
Prague. 


190 


SINAI  AND  THE  LAW. 


Lect.  VII. 


zelles  standing  out  against  the  sky;  and  no  image 
was  more  constantly  before  the  pilgrims,  of  whatever 
age  they  may  he,  who  wrote  the  mysterious  inscrip¬ 
tions  in  the  Wady  Mukatteb,  and  on  the  rock  of 
Herimat  Haggag,  than  the  long-horned  ibex.  In 
every  form  and  shape  of  exaggeration  it  is  there  to 
be  seen.  What  makes  the  enumeration  more  exclu¬ 
sively1  Arabian  in  its  character  is  the  omission  of 
the  “reem,”2  or  buffalo,  so  frequently  mentioned  in 
connection  with  the  wild  pastures  east  and  north  of 
Palestine.  In  like  manner  the  strict  prohibitions  may 
almost  all  be  traced  either  to  the  intention  of  draw¬ 
ing  some  slight  distinction  between  Israel  and  the 
mere  wanderers  of  the  desert,  as  in  the  case  of  the 
camel  and  jerboa,  or  to  the  strong  recoil  from  Egypt, 
as  in  the  case  of  the  leprous  swine  and  the  serpent, 
in  all  its  forms  and  shapes,  so  closely  connected  in 
Egypt  with  the  mystical  or  obscene  ceremonial  from 
which  they  were  now  set  free.  We  are  accustomed, 
in  the  French  and  Saxon  names  used  in  our  language 
for  the  various  kinds  of  food,  to  trace  the  relative 
social  position  of  the  Normans  and  Saxons  after  the 
Conquest.  A  similar  inference  as  to  the  original  con¬ 
dition  of  the  Israelites,  may,  in  like  manner,  be  de¬ 
duced  from  the  permission  or  prohibition  of  clean 
and  unclean  food,  which  must  have  long  outlived  the 
practical  occasion  whence  they  derived  their  first 
meaning  and  intention. 

5.  A  whole  class  of  law  appears  to  be  explained, 

1  The  spots  on  the  cliffs  of  the  2  Unless  the  word  teoh,  iN.Fl,  oc- 
Dead  Sea,  east  and  west,  where  the  eurring  only  in  Deut.  xiv.  5,  and 
ibex  is  to  be  found,  are  enumerated  in  translated  “  wild  ox,”  is  so  to  be 
Ritter,  ii.  534,  562,  580,  584,  585,  taken.  * 

587,  595,  596,  660,  673,  1096. 


Lect.  VII. 


RELICS  OF  THE  WANDERINGS. 


191 


on  the  one  hand,  by  the  peculiar  state  against  which 
they  are  aimed ;  on  the  other  hand,  by  their  Blood 
high  elevation  above  that  state,  indicating  the  revenge> 
higher  than  any  merely  national  source  from  whence 
they  came.  Of  all  the  virtues  of  civilization,  the  one 
which  most  incontestably  follows  in  its  train,  and  is 
most  rarely  anticipated  in  earlier  ages,  is  humanity. 
And  rare  as  this  is  everywhere  in  barbarous  nations, 
it  is  rarest  in  the  East.  In  the  East  and  West  the 
value  of  animal  and  of  human  life  is  exactly  re¬ 
versed.  An  Arab,  who  will  be  shocked  at  the  notion 
of  shooting  his  horse,  will  have  no  scruple  in  killing 
a  man.  And  what  was  the  fierceness  of  the  ancient 
Semitic  race,  especially,  is  apparent  both  from  the 
later  Jewish  history,  and  from  that  of  the  kindred 
nations  of  Phoenicia  and  Carthage.  Against  this 
the  laws  of  Moses,  in  war,  in  slavery,  and  in  the 
social  relations  of  life,  stand  out,  as  has  been  often 
observed,  in  marvellous  contrast.  But  there  was  one 
form  of  ferocity,  then  as  now,  peculiar  to  the  Bedouin 
tribes,  that  of  revenge  for  blood.  To  the  fourth  gen¬ 
eration  (it  is  the  exact  limit  laid  down  both  in  the 
Bedouin  custom  and  in  the  Mosaic  law),  the  lineal 
descendant  of  a  murdered  man  is  to  this  day  charged 
with  the  duty  of  avenging  his  blood.1  This  institu¬ 
tion,  so  deeply  seated  in  the  Arab  race  as  to  have 
defied  the  course  of  centuries,  and  the  efforts  of  three 
religions,  was  assumed  and  tolerated,  like  slavery, 
polygamy,  or  any  of  the  other  ancient  Asiatic  usages, 
which  more  or  less  lasted  through  the  Jewish  times. 
But  it  was  restrained  by  the  establishment  of  cities  of 
the  cities  of  refuge.  If,  for  the  hardness  of  Refuge’ 

1  The  God  (“redeemer”)  of  the  the  Arab.  Michaelis,  Laws  of  Moses, 
Hebrew  is  the  Tair  (“  survivor  ”)  of  art.  131. 


192 


SINAI  AND  THE  LAW. 


Lect.  VII. 


the  Bedouin  heart,  Moses  left  the  Avenger  of  Blood 
as  he  found  him;  yet,  for  the  tenderness  of  heart  in¬ 
fused  by  a  “  more  excellent  way,”  he  reared  those 
barriers  against  him.  The  common  law  of  the  desert 
found  itself  kept  in  check  by  the  statute  law  of  Pal¬ 
estine,  and  the  six  cities  became  (as  far  as  we  know 
from  history)  rather  monuments  of  what  had  been,  and 
of  what  might  have  been,  than  remedies  of  what  was. 

6.  These  are  the  most  obvious  instances  of  a  direct 
The  Law.  connection  of  any  part  of  the  Mosaic  Law  with 
the  code  of  the  desert.  Of  the  rest  of  the  Law,  there 
is,  for  the  most  part,  nothing  which  specially  connects 
itself  with  the  desert  life,  though  its  general  savor  of 
antiquity  throws  it  back  to  the  earliest  period  of 
which  criticism  will  admit.  The  growth  of  general 
laws  or  customs  out  of  particular  occasions  —  as  for 
example  the  rule  for  the  marriage  of  heiresses  within 
their  own  tribe  arising  out  of  the  case  of  the  daugh¬ 
ters  of  Zelophehad,1  and  the  dispensation  for  accidental 
defilement  from  the  incident  of  the  dead  body  in  the 
camp 2  —  is  precisely  the  primitive  stage  of  ancient 
law  which  we  recognize  in  the  “  Themis  ”  or  “  The- 
mistes”  of  the  Homeric  age.3  “He  cast  a  tree  into 
“  the  waters,  and  the  waters  were  made  sweet :  there 
“  he  made  for  them  a  statute  and  an  ordinance.”  This 
indication  of  the  origin  of  the  first  Mosaic  law  at  the 
well  of  Marah,  though  left  unexplained,  is  probably  a 
sample  of  the  rise  of  many  others.  Again,  the  mode 
in  which  the  religious,  civil,  moral,  and  ceremonial 
ordinances  “are  mingled  up  together,  without  any  re- 
“  gard  to  differences  in  their  essential  character,”  has 
been  well  observed4  to  be  consistent  only  with  that 


1  Num.  xxxvi.  8-11. 

2  Num.  ix.  6. 


3  See  Maine,  Ancient  Law ,  p.  4. 

4  Ibid.  16. 


V 


Lect.  VII.  THE  LAW.  193 

early  stage  of  thought,  when  law  was  not  yet  severed 
from  morality,  nor  religion  from  law,  nor  ceremony 
from  religion.  It  is,  in  fact,  this  primitive  blending  of 
heterogeneous  elements  which  has  given  rise  to  the  pe¬ 
culiar  relations  occupied  by  the  Mosaic  Law  towards 
the  Christian  Church.  “  No  law,”  says  Michaelis,1  “  of 
“  such  high  antiquity  has,  in  one  connected  body,  reached 
a  our  times,  and  it  is,  on  this  account  alone,  very  re- 
“  markable  ....  and,  so  long  as  it  remains  unknown, 
“  the  genealogy  of  our  existing  laws  may  be  said  to 
“  he  incomplete.”  Beyond  this  general  descent  of  all 
modern  laws  from  the  code  of  the  Jewish  legislator, 
it  is  extremely  difficult  to  point  out  any  principle  on 
which  parts  have  been  retained,  and  parts  abolished. 
The  Mosaic  prohibition  of  usury  continued  in  force 
throughout  Christendom  till  the  seventeenth  century. 
The  Mosaic  sanction  of  slavery  is  still  a  strong  sup¬ 
port  of  that  institution  in  the  Southern  States  of 
North  America.  Our  own  marriage  laws  are  mainly 
based  on  the  Levitical  code ;  and  the  question  of 
Henry’s  divorce,  which  formed  the  occasion  of  the 
separation  of  the  English  from  the  Boman  Church, 
turned  on  a  minute  point  of  Levitical  casuistry.  Even 
in  its  most  general  aspect,  the  relation  of  the  Mosaic 
Law  to  the  Gospel  presents  questions  hardly  yet 
answered  by  History  or  Theology.  What  was  the 
Law  of  which  the  Psalmist  spoke  as  that  in  the  keep¬ 
ing  of  which  he  found  light,  and  life,  and  peace,  and 
comfort,  and  salvation?2  or  what  the  Law  of  which 
the  Apostle  spoke  as  though  it  were  his  personal 
enemy,  the  cause  of  death,  and  the  strength  of  sin?3 

1  Laws  of  Moser,  p.  2.  Law,  the  Strength  of  Sin”  ( Commen - 

2  Ps.  xix.,  cxix.  tary  on  S.  Paul's  Epistles ,  2d  ed.,  ii. 

3  Rom.  vii.  7-11;  1  Cor.  xv.  56.  493-502). 

See  Professor  Jowett’s  Essay  on  “  The 

25 


194 


SINAI  AND  THE  LAW. 


Lect.  YIL 


What  was  that  Law  of  which  “not  one  jot  or  tittle 
“  should  pass  away,  till  all  was  fulfilled  ?  ”  or  that, 
which  with  all  its  ordinances  was  “  blotted  out,” 
“  taken  out  of  the  way,”  “  abolished  ”  ? 1  The  solution 
of  these  problems  must  be  sought  elsewhere.  It  is 
enough  here  to  indicate  them.  They  are  proofs  of 
the  remote  antiquity  of  the  code  and  the  institution, 
which  could  thus  be  personified,  idealized,  and  applied 
in  senses  so  different.  They  are  proofs,  also,  of  the 
freedom  with  which  these  various  senses  are  used  in 
the  Sacred  records  both  of  the  Jewish  and  Christian 
Churches.  It  was  this  most  ancient  and  venerable 
of  all  the  parts  of  the  Old  Dispensation,  that  fur¬ 
nished  the  antithesis,  now  become  almost  proverbial, 
between  the  “  letter  that  kills,”  and  “  the  spirit  that 
“  quickens.” 

There  is  one  portion  of  the  Law,  however,  which 
remarkably  illustrates  most  of  these  questions,  and 
which  is  evidently  a  monument  of  this  earliest  period 
of  the  history,  as  well  as  the  kernel  of  the  whole 
institution. 

We  read  that  when  the  Ark  was  carried  in  the 
The  Ten  reign  of  Solomon  to  its  last  retreat  within  the 
ments.  newly  erected  Temple,  it  was  opened  for  the 
first  time  within  the  memory  of  man,  to  examine  its 
sacred  contents.  It  is  impossible  not  to  feel  the  in¬ 
terest  of  the  moment,  when  the  ancient  lid  of  acacia 
wood  was  lifted  up,  and  those  who  had  heard  of  its 
hidden  wonders  saw  its  dark  interior.  “There  was 
“  nothing  in  the  ark  save  the  tivo  tables  of  stone ,  which 
“  Moses  put  there  at  Horeb,  when  the  Lord  made  a 
“  covenant  with  the  children  of  Israel,  when  they  came 
“out  of  Egypt.”  Nothing  save  these.  We  know  not 

1  Matt.  v.  18 ;  Col.  ii.  14 ;  Eph.  ii.  15. 


Lect.  VII. 


THE  TEN  COMMANDMENTS. 


195 


their  form  or  size.  But  we  know  the  hard,  imper¬ 
ishable  granite  of  which  they  must  have  been  hewn ; 
we  know  its  red  hue ;  the  style  of  engraving  must 
have  been  such  as  can  be  still  discerned  in  the  Des¬ 
ert  Inscriptions.  These  venerable  fragments  of  the 
rock  of  Sinai,  seen  then,  were  seen,  as  far  as  we  know, 
for  the  last  time.  They  must  have  perished,  or  at 
least  disappeared,  when  the  Ark  itself  perished  or  dis¬ 
appeared  in  the  capture  of  Jerusalem  by  Nebuchad¬ 
nezzar.  But  their  contents  have  survived  the  wreck, 
not  only  of  the  Ark  and  Temple,  but  of  the  whole 
system  of  worship,  of  which  they  were  the  basis.  The 
Ten  Commandments  delivered  on  Mount  Sinai  have  be¬ 
come  embedded  in  the  heart  of  the  religion  which 
has  succeeded.  Side  by  side  with  the  Prayer  of  our 
Lord,  and  with  the  Creed  of  His  Church,  they  appear 
inscribed  on  our  churches,  read  from  our  altars,  taught 
to  our  children,  as  the  foundation  of  all  morality. 

The  form  in  which  they  were  presented  to  Israel  in 
the  wilderness  is  but  of  slight  importance.  Their  out- 
Yet  five  points  may  be  observed,  as  indicat-  peai’ance. 
ing  their  primitive,  impenetrable  simplicity.  First,  the 
number,  Ten,  as  drawn  from  the  most  obvious  form 
of  calculation,  becomes,  as  if  in  imitation  of  this  sa¬ 
cred  code,  the  form  in  which  many  of  the  lesser 
enactments  are  cast.  As  many  as  six  groups  of  this 
kind  may  be  traced 1  in  the  different  parts  of  the  Pen¬ 
tateuch.  Secondly,  the  fact  that  they  were  on  two 
blocks  of  stone,  probably  of  nearly  equal  size,  and  the 
variations  in  the  versions  of  Exodus  and  Deuteronomy, 
almost  necessarily  lead  to  the  inference  that  the  Com- 

1  (1)  Ex.  xxi.  2-11.  (2)  Ex.  xxii.  (6)  Levit.  vii.  11-21.  Ewald,  ii.  157— 
6-26.  (3)  Ex.  xxiii.  1-9.  (4)  Ex.  159.  He  gives  others,  but  they  seem 

xxiii.  10-19.  (5)  Levit.  vii.  1-10.  too  uncertain  to  deserve  notice. 


196 


SINAI  AND  THE  LAW. 


I 


Lect.  VII. 


mandments  alone  must  have  been  engraven  without 
the  reasons  for  their  observance.  Thirdly,  the  same 
general  consideration,  combined  with  the  form  in  which 
the  Commandments  run,  indicates  that  the  original  di¬ 
vision  of  the  Tables  differed  from  that  of  all  modern 
churches.  Five  Commandments  were  in  all  probability 
on  the  first,  and  five  on  the  second  table ;  amongst 
those  on  the  first  would  thus  be  included  that  winch 
now  usually  ranks  at  the  head  of  the  second,  hut 
which  then  was  placed  amongst  the  general  command¬ 
ments  of  reverence  to  superiors  whether  divine  or 
human.1  Fourthly,  unlike  our  modern  idea  of  the 
Commandments,  but  like  the  written  rocks  of  the 
desert,  the  inscriptions  run  over  both  sides :  a  the  ta- 
“  bles  were  written  on  both  their  sides ;  on  the  one 
“  side  and  the  other  were  they  written.” 2  This  was 
probably  to  give  the  impression  of  their  completeness. 
Fifthly,  they  are  not  properly  “  the  Ten  Commandments ,” 
but  “  the  Ten  Words”8  —  Decalogue.  Hence  the  first 
of  them  is,  in  the  Jewish  division,  not  a  command¬ 
ment  at  all. 

This  was  the  form:  what  was  the  substance  of  the 
Ten  Commandments  ?  .  .  .  What  has  the  human 

Their  iden-  race  gained  by  its  adoption  of  what  Burckhardt 
of  morality  called  u  the  code  of  the  Beni-Israel  ?  ”  It  is, 

&0  d  re- 

ligion.  in  one  word,  the  declaration  of  the  indivisible 
unity  of  morality  with  religion.  It  was  the  boast  of 
Josephus,4  that  whereas  other  legislators  had  made  re¬ 
ligion  to  be  a  part  of  virtue,  Moses  had  made  virtue 
to  he  a  part  of  religion.  Of  this,  amongst  all  other 
indications,  the  Ten  Commandments  are  the  most 

1  As  Pieias  amongst  the  Romans.  2  Ex.  xxxii.  15. 

Ewald,  ii.  151.  So  Philo  and  Jose-  3  See  margin  of  Exod.  xxxiv.  28. 

phus,  and  Irenaeus  ( Hcer .  ii.  13).  4  C.  Apion ,  ii.  17. 


Lect.  VII. 


THE  TEN  COMMANDMENTS. 


197 


remarkable  and  enduring  example  Delivered  with 
every  solemnity  of  which  place  and  time  could  admit, 
treasured  up  with  every  sanctity  wThich  Religion  could 
confer,  within  the  holiest  shrine  of  the  holiest  of  the 
holy  places,  —  more  sacred  than  altar  of  sacrifice,  or 
altar  of  incense,  —  they  yet  contain  almost  nothing  of 
local  or  ceremonial  injunction.  However  sacred  the 
ritual  with  which  they  and  the  other  moral  laws  were 
surrounded,  yet  we  have  the  highest  authority  for  dis¬ 
tinguishing  between  what  was  essential  and  non-essen¬ 
tial  in  the  Mosaic  institutions,  and  for  believing  that 
even  the  whole  sacrificial  system  was  as  nothing  com¬ 
pared  with  the  Decalogue  and  its  enforcements.  “I 
“  spake  not  unto  your  fathers,  nor  commanded  them, 
“  in  the  day  that  I  brought  them  out  of  the  land  of 
“  Egypt,  concerning  burnt  offerings  or  sacrifices.  But 
“  this  thing  commanded  I  them,  saying,  Obey  my  voice, 
“  and  I  will  be  your  God,  and  ye  shall  be  my  people.” 1 

If  there  was  in  the  Fourth  commandment  the  injunc¬ 
tion  to  consecrate,  by  unbroken  rest,  the  seventh  day 
of  every  week,  yet  experience  has  shown  how  widely 
adapted  the  principle  of  this  observance  has  been  to 
all  times  and  countries.  Even  those  who  most  zeal¬ 
ously  repudiate  the  obligation  of  the  Mosaic  Law,  and 
who  dwell  most  forcibly  on  the  distinction  between 
the  Jewish  Sabbath  and  the  Christian  Sunday,  acknowl¬ 
edge  that  no  other  ancient  ceremony  has  so  main¬ 
tained  its  hold  on  the  world,  and  that  without  its 
antecedent  support  the  observance  of  Sunday  would 
hardly  have  exercised  the  beneficial  influence  which 
none  deny  to  it.  The  Patriarchal  rites  of  Circumcision 
and  of  Sacrifice  have  vanished  away,  but  the  name  of 
the  Sabbath  of  the  Decalogue,  the  Sabbath  of  Mount 


1  Jer.  vii.  21-23. 


198 


SINAI  AND  THE  LAW. 


Lect.  YH 


Sinai, —  as  if  it  partook  of  the  universal  spirit  of  the 
code  in  which  it  is  enshrined,  —  is  still,  as  though  by 
a  natural  anomaly,  revered  by  thousands  of  Gentile 
Christians.  If  this  be  so  even  in  the  one  exception 
to  the  spiritual  and  moral  character  of  the  Decalogue, 
much  more  is  it  with  the  remaining  nine  of  these  fun¬ 
damental  laws.  “  Thou  shalt  have  none  other  gods  but 
“  One,”  “  Thou  shalt  do  no  murder,”  “  Thou  shalt  not 
“  commit  adultery,”  “  Thou  shalt  not  steal,”  are  still  as 
impressive  and  as  applicable  as  when  first  heard  and 
written.  And  if  in  the  Second,  and  Fourth,  and  Fifth 
commandments  some  expressions  retain  a  local  and 
temporary  character,  yet  these  do  but  serve  as  proofs 
of  the  hoary  antiquity  from  which  they  have  come 
down  to  us.  The  words  were  “  written  by  the  finger 
“  of  God,”  but  the  Tables  were  not  less  surely  fragments 
hewn  out  of  the  rock  of  Horeb.  Hard,  stiff,  abrupt  as 
the  cliffs  from  which  they  were  taken,  they  remain  as 
the  firm,  unyielding  basis  on  which  all  true  spiritual 
religion  has  been  built  up  and  sustained.  Sinai  is  not 
Palestine, —  the  Law  is  not  the  Gospel;  but  the  Ten 
Commandments,  in  letter  and  in  spirit,  remain  to  us 
as  the  relic  of  that  time.  They  represent  to  us,  both 
in  fact  and  in  idea,  the  granite  foundation,  the  immova¬ 
ble  mountain  on  which  the  world  is  built  up  ;  without 
which  all  theories  of  religion  are  but  as  shifting  and 
fleeting  clouds ;  they  give  us  the  two  homely  fun¬ 
damental  laws,  which  all  subsequent  Revelation  has 
but  confirmed  and  sanctified,  —  the  Law  of  our  duty 
towards  God,  and  the  Law  of  our  duty  towards  our 
neighbor. 


Lect.  VIII. 


KADESH  AND  PISGAH. 


199 


LECTURE  VIII. 

KADESH  AND  PISGAH. 

The  close  of  the  history  of  the  Wanderings  bears 
on  its  face  the  marks  of  confusion  and  omission. 

Two  stages  alone  of  the  journey  are  distinctly 
visible,  from  Sinai  to  Kadesh,  and  from  Kadesh  to 
Moab. 

I.  I  have  elsewhere  pointed  out  the  profound  ob¬ 
scurity  in  which  the  Mosaic  narrative  has  Journey 

.  from  Sinai 

wrapt  the  first  of  these  two  periods.1  Not  to  Kadesh. 
merely  are  the  names  of  nearly  all  the  encampments 
still  lost  in  uncertainty,  but  the  narrative  itself  draws 
the  mind  of  the  reader  in  different  directions;  and 
the  variations,  in  some  instances  as  it  would  seem, 
of  the  text  itself,  repel2  detailed  inquiry  still  more 
positively. 

To  this  outward  confusion  corresponds  the  inward 
and  spiritual  aspect  of  the  history.  It  is  the  period 
of  reaction,  and  contradiction,  and  failure.  It  is  chosen 
by  S.  Paul3  as  the  likeness  of  the  corresponding  fail¬ 
ure  of  the  first  efforts  of  the  primitive  Christian 
Church;  —  the  one  “type”  of  the  Jewish  History  ex¬ 
pressly  mentioned  by  the  writers  of  the  New  Testa- 

1  Sinai  and  Palestine,  92.  “  types  ”  in  the  original.  This  is  the 

2  Comp.  Deut.  x.  6.  7,  with  Num.  true  meaning  of  the  word ;  and  it  is 

xxxiii.  30-36.  the  only  case  in  which  it  is  applied  in 

3  1  Cor.  x.  11.  “  These  things  hap-  the  New  Testament  to  the  Jewish 

pened  unto  them  for  examples  ”  —  History. 


200 


KADESH  AND  PISGAH. 


Lect  VIII 


ment.  It  left  hardly  any  permanent  trace  on  the 
history  of  the  people,  and,  therefore,  according  to  the 
plan  laid  down  in  these  Lectures,  may  be  passed  with 
the  same  rapidity  with  which  it  is  passed  by  the 
Sacred  Eecord  itself.  Some  few  institutions,  or  frag¬ 
ments,  however,  of  institutions,  come  down  to  the 
Jewish,  and  even  into  the  Christian  Church,  from  that 
time  ’  and  some  few  salient  points  emerge  full  of 
eternal  significance. 


The  brazen  plates  which  covered  the  ancient  wooden 
The  brazen  altar,  and  which  were  perpetuated  in  “  the 

plates  of  11 

the  altar.  “  brazen  altar  ”  of  Solomon’s  temple,  were 
traced  back  to  the  relics  of  the  censers  of  brass 
which  had  belonged  to  the  chiefs  of  the  great  con¬ 
spiracy  of  the  tribes  of  Levi  and  Reuben  against  the 
rule  of  the  two  prophet-brothers  of  the  family  of 
Conspiracy  Aaron.  Never  again  did  Levi  make  the  at- 
Reuben.  tempt  to  gain  the  possession  of  the  priest¬ 
hood  ;  nor  Reuben  to  seize  the  reins  of  government. 
The  two  tribes  afterwards  became  entirely  parted 
asunder  in  their  characters  and  fortunes :  the  one  was 
incorporated  into  the  innermost  circle  of  the  settled 
civilization  of  Palestine ;  the  other  hovered  on  the 
very  outskirts  of  the  Holy  Land  and  chosen  people, 
and  dwindled  away  into  a  Bedouin  tribe.  But  the 
story  of  Korah  belongs  to  a  time  when  they,  with 
Simeon,  still  breathed  the  same  fierce  and  uncontrol¬ 
lable  spirit  of  their  Arabian  ancestry ;  when  Levi  was 
still  fresh  from  the  great  crisis  in  Sinai,  by  which 
their  tribe  had  been  consecrated  and  divided  from 
the  rest;  when  the  recollection  of  the  birthright  of 
Reuben  still  lingered  in  the  minds  of  his  descendants. 
In  the  desert  they  marched  side  by  side ;  and  their 
joint  conspiracy  naturally  grew  out  of  their  joint 


Lect.  VIII. 


JOURNEY  TO  KADESH. 


201 


neighborhood.1  It  was  the  last  expiring  effort  of  the 
old  traditions  of  the  Beni-Israel  against  the  constitu¬ 
tion  of  the  new  order  of  things,  which  every  gener¬ 
ation  would  more  firmly  establish.  “  Thou  leddest 
“Thy  people  like  sheep  by  the  hand  of  Moses  and 
“  Aaron.” 

Another  relic  of  that  dark  time  was  one  which  re¬ 
mained  till  the  time  of  Hezekiah  in  the  Jew- The  Brazen 
ish  Church,  but  which,  partly  in  symbol  Serpent' 
and  partly  in  pretensions  to  the  reality,  has  prevailed 
even  to  our  own  day  in  the  Christian  Church.  “The 
“serpent  of  brass  that  Moses  had  made”  was  long 
cherished  as  a  sacred  image  in  the  sanctuaries  of 
Judah  and  Jerusalem.  Incense  was  offered  to  it,  and 
a  name  conferred  on  it ; 2  and,  even  after  its  destruc¬ 
tion  by  Hezekiah,  the  recollection  of  it  was  still  so 
endeared  to  the  nation,  that  from  it  was  drawn  one 
of  the  most  sacred  similitudes  of  the  New  Testament; 
and  even  the  Christian  Church  claimed  for  centuries 
to  have  preserved  its  very  form  intact  in  the  church 
of  S.  Ambrose,  at  Milan.  The  snakes  against  which 
the  brazen  serpent  was  originally  raised  as  a  protec¬ 
tion,  were  peculiar  to  the  eastern  portion  of  the 
-  Sinaitic  desert.  There,  and  nowhere  else,  and  in  no 
other  moment  of  their  history,  could  this  symbol  have 
originated. 

Amidst  the  general  obscurity  and  doubts  of  this 
period  of  the  wanderings,  one  spot  emerges,  if  not 
into  certainty,  at  least  into  unmistakable  prominence. 

1  See  Blunt’s  Undesigned  Coinci-  words  “  one  called  it,”  i.  <?.,  “  it  was 

dences,  Pt.  I.  §  xx.  commonly  called.”  See  Mr.  Wright 

2  2  Kings  xviii.  4.  Our  translation  in  Diet,  of  the  Bible ,  “  Nehushtan.” 
treats  the  name  Nehushtan  as  a  title  The  name  seems  to  combine  the  sig- 
of  contempt  applied  to  it  by  Hezekiah,  nifications  of  “  serpent,”  “  brass,”  “  div* 
but  it  is  more  accurate  to  render  the  “  ination.” 

26 


202 


KADESH. 


Lect.  YIIL 


It  is  in  this  stage  of  the  history,  almost  what  Sinai 
was  in  the  first.  “He  brought  them  to  Mount  Sinai 

Kadesh.  “  and  to  Kadesh  Barnea.” 1  It  is  the  only 

place  dignified  by  the  name  of  a  “  city.”  Its  very 
name  implies  its  sanctity,  —  “  the  Holy  Place  ;  ”  as  if, 
like  Mount  Sinai  itself,  it  had  a  sacredness  of  its  own 
before  the  host  of  Israel  encamped  within  its  precincts : 
possibly  from  the  old  oracular  spring  of  judgment2 
described  in  the  earliest  times  of  the  Canaanitish  his¬ 
tory.  The  encampment  there  is  distinct  in  character 
from  any  other  in  the  wilderness,  except  the  stay  at 
Sinai.  Once,  if  not  twice,  “  they  abode  there  many 

days.”  Situated  as  it  was  within  the  Edomite  terri¬ 

tory,  its  close  connection  with  Israel  invested  with  a 
kind  of  Sinai  tic  glory  the  whole  range  of  the  Idu- 
mean  mountains.  “0  Jehovah,  when  Thou  wentest 
“  out  of  Seir,  when  Thou  marchedst  out  of  Edom .” 3 
“  God  came  from  Teman ,  and  the  Holy  One  from 
“  Mount  Paran  ” 4  “  Jehovah  came  from  Sinai  and  rose 

“  up  from  Mount  Seir  unto  them :  He  shined  forth 
“  from  Mount  Paran,  and  He  came  with  the  ten  thou- 
“  sands  of  Kadesh.” 5 

On  what  precise  spot  amongst  the  rocks  of  Edom  this 
Petra.  “  Holy  Place  ”  was  enshrined,  is  a  question  even  * 
more  uncertain  than  that  which  regards  the  exact  lo¬ 
cality  of  Sinai.  But  nothing  has  been  yet  discovered 
to  shake  the  substantial  truth  of  the  Jewish,  Mussulman, 
and  Christian  traditions,  which  have  fixed  it  in  the 
neighborhood  of  the  city  afterwards  known  by  the 
name  of  the  “  Cliff,”  or  “  Bock.”  That  huge  sandstone 
“cliff,”  through  which  the  most  romantic  of  ravines 

1  Judith  v.  14.  3  Judg.  v,  4. 

2  En-Mishpat,  “  Spring  of  Judg-  4  Hab.  iii.  3. 

ment,”  —  “  which  is  Kadesh,”  Gen.  5  So  the  LXX.  in  Deut.  xxxiii.  2. 
xiv.  7.  See  Ewald,  ii.  257. 


Lect.  VIII. 


ITS  SITUATION. 


203 


admits  the  stream  of  living  water  to  fertilize  the  ba¬ 
son  of  Petra,  and  which,  doubtless,  was  the  origin  of 
the  later  Hebrew  and  Greek  title  of  the  city,  still 
bears  the  name  of  Moses ;  and  in  its  rent  the  Arabian 
tribes  still  believe  that  they  see  the  mark  of  his  won¬ 
der-working  staff. 

It  is  this  scene  of  the  giving  of  water  to  the  angry 
Israelites  and  “  their  beasts  ”  (“  The  Thirst  ”  of  Murillo’s 
famous  picture),  on  which  our  attention  is  chiefly  fixed, 
and  which  is  identified  either  with  the  new  name,  or 
the  new  turn  given  to  the  old  name  of  the  place, 
“  Meribah  Kadesh,” 1  “  Strife  and  Sanctity  But  there 
are  two  other  events  which  more  distinctly  mark  the 
stage  of  the  history  at  which  we  have  arrived.  In 
Kadesh  passed  away  the  eldest  born  of  the  ruling 
family  of  Israel.  “  Miriam  died  there  and  was  Death  and 
buried  there,”  in  one  of  the  rock-hewn  tombs  Miriam, 
which  perforate  the  whole  range  of  the  hills  surround¬ 
ing  Petra ;  it  may  be,  in  that  secluded  spot  still  known 2 
by  the  sacred  name  of  the  “  Convent,”  still  scaled  by 
the  long  ascent  cut  out  of  the  rock  for  the  approach 
of  pilgrims  in  ages  beyond  the  reach  of  history.  The 
mourning  for  her  death,  according  to  Josephus,3  lasted 
for  thirty  days,  and  was  terminated 4  by  the  ceremony 
which  remained  to  the  last  days  of  the  Commonwealth, 
the  sacrifice,  as  if  in  special  allusion  to  the  departed 
Prophetess,  of  the  red  Heifer.  Close  in  the  neighbor¬ 
hood  of  Kadesh  passed  away  the  second  of  the  family. 
On  the  summit  of  Mount  Hor,  immediately  Death  and 

.  burial  of 

facing  that  other  sanctuary  of  which  we  just  Aaron, 
now  spoke,  has,  for  at  least  two  thousand  years,  been 

1  Numb.  xx.  12,  13.  she  was  buried  in  state  on  the  top  of 

2  See  Sinai  and  Palestine ,  96.  Mount  Sin. 

3  He  states  {Ant.  iv.  4,  §  6)  that  4  Josephus,  Ant.  iv.  4,  §  6. 


204 


KADESH. 


Lect.  YIII. 


shown  the  grave  of  Aaron.  From  that  craggy  top  he 
—  like  his  younger  brother,  forbidden  to  enter  the 
Promised  Land  —  surveyed,  though  in  a  far  more  dis¬ 
tant  view,  the  outskirts  of  Palestine.  He  surveyed, 
too,  in  its  fullest  extent,  the  dreary  mountains,  barren 
platform,  and  cheerless  valley,  of  the  desert  through 
which  they  had  passed.  It  was  a  Pisgah,  not  of  pros¬ 
pect,  but  of  retrospect :  it  was,  if  we  may  venture  so 
far  to  draw  out  its  meaning,  the  appropriate  end  of 
the  chief  representative  of  the  sacerdotal  order  of  his 
nation,  clinging  to  the  past,  looking  back  to  Egypt, 
with  no  encouraging  word  for  the  future ;  —  the  oppo¬ 
site  of  that  wide  and  varied  vista  which  opened  be¬ 
fore  the  first  of  the  Prophets.  The  succession  of  the 
Priesthood,  that  link  of  continuity  between  the  past 
and  present,  now  first  introduced  into  the  Jewish 
Church,  and  amidst  all  changes  of  form  never  entirely 
lost  in  the  Christian  Church,  —  was  continued  to  his 
son  Eleazar.  It  was  made  through  that  singular  usage, 
preserved  even  to  the  latest  days1  of  the  Jewish  hie¬ 
rarchy,  by  the  transference  of  the  vestments  and  dra¬ 
pery  of  the  dead  High  Priest  to  the  living  successor. 
“  Moses  stripped  Aaron  of  his  garments  and  put  them 
“  upon  Eleazar  his  son,  and  Aaron  died  there  in  the 
“  top  of  the  mount ;  and  Moses  and  Eleazar  came  down 
“  from  the  mount,  and  when  all  the  congregation  saw 
“  that  Aaron  was  dead,  they  mourned  for  Aaron  thirty 
“  days,  even  all  the  house  of  Israel.”  In  this,  their 
first  great  national  sorrow,  they  parted  from  Kadesh, 
from  Mount  Hor,  and  from  the  inhospitable  race  of 
their  kindred  tribe  of  Esau;  under  the  now  undivided 
sway  of  the  youngest,  and  greatest,  and  only  remain¬ 
ing  child  of  the  family  of  Amram. 

1  Ewald,  Geschichte ,  v.  13. 


Lect.  VIII. 


DOUBTS  OP  MOSES. 


205 


Even  he  had  borne  his  share  in  the  gloom  of  this 
period.  In  the  incident  of  the  calling  forth  of  Doubts  of 
the  water  from  the  cliff  of  Kadesh,  occurs  the  Moses' 
expression  of  distrust  on  the  part  not  only  of  Aaron 
but  of  Moses.1  It  is  but  a  single  blot  in  the  career 
of  the  Prophet,  and  it  is  but  slightly  touched  by  the 
Sacred  narrative.  Still  it  was  thought  sufficiently  im¬ 
portant  for  Josephus,  after  his  manner,  to  suppress  all 
mention  of  it;  and  it  just  reveals  that  shade  of  weak¬ 
ness  in  the  character  of  Moses,  which  adds  so  much 
to  its  general  strength. 

He  doubted,  and  his  doubt  is  not  concealed.  He 
doubted  once  in  a  moment  of  gloom  and  irritation ; 
but  he  did  not,  therefore,  doubt  everything  and  al¬ 
ways  :  and  he  is  not  less  revered  as  the  chief  Prophet 
of  the  Jewish  Church.  It  is  to  this  side  of  his  char¬ 
acter  that,  in  the  Koran,  is  attached  the  remarkable 
story  intended  to  repress  his  murmurs  against  the  in¬ 
scrutable  ways  of  Providence,  which  tells  how  he  met, 
by  the  shores  of  the  Red  Sea,  the  mysterious  visitant 
from  the  other  world,  El  Khudr,  “  The  Green,  story  of  E1 
“  or  Immortal  One,  One  of  the  servants  of  God.”  Khudr- 
And  Moses  said  unto  him,  “Shall  I  follow  thee,  that 
“  thou  mayest  teach  me  part  of  that  which  thou  hast 
“  been  taught  for  a  direction  unto  me  ?  ”  He  answered, 
“Verily  thou  canst  not  bear  with  me;  for  how  canst 
“  thou  patiently  suffer  those  things  the  knowledge 
“  whereof  thou  dost  not  comprehend  ?  ”  Moses  re¬ 
plied,  “  Thou  shalt  find  me  patient  if  God  please ; 
“  neither  will  I  be  disobedient  unto  thee  in  anything.” 
jHe  said,  “  If  thou  follow  me,  therefore,  ask  me  not  con- 

1  “  Shall  we,”  i.  e.  1  can  we  ’  (not  the  ground  of  his  exclusion  from  Pal- 
‘  shall  we ’)  “fetch  water  out  of  this  estine,  in  Num.  xxvii.  12-14,  Deut. 
‘  cliff/  ”  Num.  xx.  10.  It  is  only  made  xxxii.  51. 


206 


KADESH. 


Lect.  Y1II. 


u  cerning  anything  until  I  declare  the  meaning  thereof 
“  unto  thee.”  They  proceed  on  their  journey.  The 
stranger  successively  makes  a  hole  in  a  ship  on  the 
sea,  slays  an  innocent  youth,  and  rebuilds  a  tottering 
wall  in  a  city  where  they  had  been  unjustly  treated. 
At  each  transaction  Moses  asks  the  reason  and  is  re¬ 
buked.  At  the  conclusion  the  explanation  is  given. 

“  The  vessel  belonged  to  certain  poor  men,  and  I  was 
“  minded  to  render  it  unserviceable,  because  there  was 
u  a  certain  King  behind  them  who  took  every  sound 
u  ship  by  force.  The  youth,  had  he  grown  up,  would 
“  have  vexed  his  parents  by  ingratitude  and  perverse- 
“  ness.  The  wall  belonged  to  two  orphan  youths,  and 
“  under  it  was  hidden  a  treasure ;  and  their  father  was 
“  a  righteous  man ;  and  thy  Lord  was  pleased  that  they 
“  should  attain  to  their  full  age,  and  take  forth  this 
u  treasure  by  the  mercy  of  thy  Lord.  And  I  did  not 
“  what  thou  hast  seen  by  my  own  will,  but  by  God’s 
“  direction.  This  is  the  interpretation  of  that  which 
“  thou  couldest  not  hear  with  patience.” 1 

II.  From  this  point,  the  geography  and  the  history 
journey  at  once  begin  to  clear  up.  We  trace  the  course 
Kadesh  to  °f  the  host  with  the  utmost  distinctness  down 
M°ab.  the  Arabah  to  the  Gulf  of  Elath.  At  the  head 
of  the  gulf  —  to  be  no  more  revisited  by  Israelitish 
wanderers,  till  it  became  the  exit  of  Solomon’s  com¬ 
merce  —  they  turned  the  southern  corner  of  the  Idu- 
mean  range  by  the  Wady  Ithm,  and  then  skirting  the 
: eastern  frontier  of  Edom,  finally  crossed  into  what 
became  their  home  for  many  months,  perhaps  years, 
—  the  vast  range  of  forest  and  pasture  on  the  east* 
of  the  Jordan. 

1  Koran ,  c.  xviii.  64-81.  This  is  most  universally  interesting  of  the 
the  story  adopted  in  Parnell’s  Hermit,  traditions  concerning  Moses. 

I  have  incorporated  it  here,  as  the 


Lect.  Yin. 


JOURNEY  TO  PISGAH. 


207 


It  was  a  marked  epoch  in  their  journeyings  —  al¬ 
most  an  anticipation  of  the  passage  of  the  Pas5ageof 
Jordan  itself —  when,  after  having  crossed  the  the  Zered# 
watercourse  or  torrent,  shaded'  or  overgrown  by  wil 
lows,1  that  formed  the  first  boundary  of  the  desert,  they 
passed  the  stream  of  the  Arnon, —  the  first  that  Passageof 
they  had  seen  since  the  Nile,  —  which,  flowing  the  Arnon- 
through  its  deep  defile  of  sandstone  rocks,  parts  the 
cultivated  land  of  Moab  from  the  wild  mountains  of 
Edom.  Two  fragments  of  ancient  song  remain,  cele¬ 
brating  with  triumphant  strains  these  two  memorable 
fords,  — 

“  Now  rise  up, 

And  get  you  over  the  watercourse  of  Zered.”  2 

And  again,  in  still  more  emphatic  language, — 

“  What  he  did  in  the  flags  by  the  river  side, 

And  in  the  torrents  of  Arnon, 

And  at  the  pouring  forth  of  the  brooks 
That  goeth  down  to  the  dwellings  of  Ar 
And  lieth  on  the  border  of  Moab.”  3 

Their  first  halt  brings  before  us  a  scene,  such  as 
had  before,  doubtless,  marked  their  encamp-  The  n  f 
ments  in  the  desert,  but  now  with  an  indica- the  heroes- 
tion  that  they  were  approaching  the  cultivated  land. 
It  was  no  longer  by  the  natural  springs,  as  of  Elim 
or  Marah,  nor  by  the  living  stream  gushing  out  *  of 
the  rock,  as  at  Horeb  and  Kadesh,  that  they  rested. 
Here,  as  on  the  southern  frontier  of  Palestine,  Beer - 
sheba,  and  i><?£r-lahai-roi,  we  find  “  the  well,”  the  deep 
cavity  sunk  in  the  earth  by  the  art  of  man.  Long 
afterwards  the  spot  was  known,  from  th>  the  first 


1  The  watercourse  of  Zered,  “  the  vi.  14)  is  spoken  of  as  the  southern 

abundant  tree,”  (Deut.  ii.  13,  18)  or  frontier  of  Moab. 
of  “  the  willows  ”  (Isa.  xv.  7  ;  Amos  2  Deut.  ii.  1 3. 

3  Num.  xxi.  1 1,  15. 


208 


PISGAH. 


lect.  vm. 


visit,  as  Beer-elim }  “  the  well  of  the  heroes.”  Rab¬ 
binical  tradition  represented  it  as  the  last  appearance 
of  the  spring  or  well  of  Miriam,  that  had  followed 
them  through  their  wanderings,  and  had  bubbled  up 
once  more  before  it  finally  plunged  into  the  Lake  of 
Gennesareth. 

But  the  original  account  of  it  is  more  touching  even 
than  this  picturesque  legend,2  — 

“  That  is  the  well  whereof  the  Lord  said  unto  M> 
“  ses  — 

“  Gather  the  people  together, 

I  will  give  them  water.” 

The  nation  long  preserved  the  song  addressed,  as  if 
with  a  passionate  invocation,  to  the  water  which  lay 
hid  in  this  well,  by  those  who  came  to  draw  from  it. 

“  Spring  up,  O  well !  sing  ye  unto  it ! 

The  well  which  the  princes  digged, 

The  nobles  of  the  people  digged  it 
With  the  sceptre  of  the  Lawgiver, 

With  the  ‘  staves  of  their  tribes/  ” 

It  was  the  expression  of  the  thankful  feeling  that  in 
that  simple  but  precious  gift  of  water  all  had  borne 
their  part  from  the  least  to  the  greatest:  that  it  was 
no  ordinary  tool,  no  staff  of  divination,  but  the  rod  of 
their  great  leader  Moses,  the  sceptres  of  the  chiefs  of 
thq  tribes  that  had  wrought  this  homely  work,  ami 
left  the  refreshing  boon  to  posterity.  There  are  many 
who  hail  this  clear,  undoubted  burst  of  primitive 3 
Hebrew  poetry,  out  of  the  disjointed  structure  of  the 
Sacred  History,  almost  as  gratefully  as  the  event  which 
it  commemorates  was  hailed  by  the  Israelites  them¬ 
selves. 

1  Isa.  xv.  8;  see  Sinai  and  Pales-  on  “Beer”  and  “  Beer-elim,”  in  Diet, 

tine,  Appendix,  §  56.  of  Bible. 

2  See  Lecture  VI.,  and  Mr.  Grove  3  Compare  Herder  ( Spirit  of  He¬ 

brew  Poetry ,  vol.  xxxiv.  p.  225). 


lect.  vm. 


BALAAM. 


209 


From  their  entrance  into  the  territory  of  Moab  the 
history  presents  itself  under  two  distinct  as-  The  last 

J  1  it  days  of 

pects.  The  first  is  that  of  the  earliest  stage  Moses, 
of  the  conquest  of  Palestine.  The  second  is  that  of 
the  last  days  of  Moses.  The  first  of  these  will  be 
most  conveniently  considered  in  detail  in  the  next 
Lecture.  But  the  general  results  of  this  conquest  in¬ 
troduce  a  scene  in  the  history  which  can  only  he  con¬ 
sidered  in  this  place,  because  it  suddenly  gives  us, 
before  we  finally  take  farewell  of  the  great  Prophet 
of  Israel,  a  glimpse  of  another  Prophet,  who  for  a  mo¬ 
ment  fills  our  whole  view,  and  who,  though  he  leaves 
no  enduring  mark  on  the  history  of  the  Jewish  Church, 
has  occupied  so  large  a  place  in  Christian  theology  as 
to  rank  amongst  the  most  interesting  characters  of  the 
Old  Dispensation. 

A  unity  of  place  links  together  the  Two  Prophets, 
else  so  wide  apart ;  and,  as  if  with  a  consciousness  of 
this,  the  shadow  of  the  great  mountain,  where  the  two 
scenes  which  connect  them  were  enacted,  is  thrown 
before  at  the  very  beginning  of  this  portion  of  the 
narrative.  “  They  came  from  Nahali-el  to  Bamoth,  c  the 
“  high  places/  and  from  Bamoth  to  the  ‘  ravine  ’  that 
a  is  in  the  field  of  Moab,  to  the  top  of  ‘  Pisgah  which 
“looketh  towards  Jeshimon,1  the  waste/” 

1.  It  is  one  of  the  striking  proofs  of  the  Divine  uni¬ 
versality  of  the  Old  Testament,  that  the  veil  Balaam, 
is  from  time  to  time  drawn  aside,  and  other  charac¬ 
ters  than  those  which  belonged  to  the  Chosen  People 
appear  in  the  distance,  fraught  with  an  instruction 
which  even  transcends  the  limits  of  the  Jewish  Church, 
and  not  only  in  place,  but  in  time,  far  outruns  the 
teaching  of  any  peculiar  age  or  nation.  Such  is  the 

1  Num.  xxi.  20. 


27 


210 


PISGAH. 


Lect.  VIII. 


discussion  of  the  profoundest  questions  of  religious 
philosophy  in  the  hook  of  the  Gentile  Job.  Such  is 
the  appearance  of  the  Gentile  Prophet  Balaam.  He 
is  one  of  those  characters  of  whom,  whilst  so  little  is 
told  that  we  seem  to  know  nothing  of  him,  yet,  what- 
Hisposi-  ever  little  is,  raises  him  at  once  to  the 
tlon>  highest  pitch  of  interest.  His  home  is  beyond1 

the  Euphrates,  amongst  the  mountains  where  the  vast 
streams  of  Mesopotamia  have  their  rise.  But  his  fame 
is  known  across  the  Assyrian  desert,  through  the  Ara¬ 
bian  tribes,  down  to  the  very  shores  of  the  Dead  Sea. 
He  ranks  as  a  warrior  chief  (by  that  combination  of 
soldier  and  prophet,  already  seen  in  Moses  himself) 
with  the  five  kings  of  Midian.2  He  is  regarded 
throughout  the  whole  of  the  East  as  a  Prophet,  whose 
blessing  or  whose  curse  was  irresistible,  the  rival,  the 
possible  conqueror  of  Moses.  In  his  career  is  seen  that 
recognition  of  Divine  Inspiration  outside  the  Chosen 
People,  which  the  narrowness  of  modern  times  has  been 
so  eager  to  deny,  but  which  the  Scriptures3  are  al¬ 
ways  ready  to  acknowledge,  and,  by  acknowledging, 
admit  within  the  pale  of  the  teachers  of  the  Universal 
Church,  the  higher  spirits  of  every  age  and  of  every 
nation. 

His  character,  Oriental  and  primeval  though  it  be,  is 


1  Num.  xxii.  5,  xxiii.  7,  xxiv.  6  ;  “  the 
river  ”  =  Euphrates. 

2  lb.  xxxi.  8. 

3  Josephus  (Ant.  iv.  6,  §  13)  consid¬ 
ers  it  a  special  matter  of  commenda¬ 
tion  on  Moses  that,  in  spite  of  Balaam’s 
hostility  to  the  chosen  people,  he  yet 
“  rightly  honored  him  by  thus  record¬ 
ing  his  prophecies,”  which  he  might 
have  appropriated  to  himself.  The 
form  of  this  statement  is  conceived  in 


the  prosaic  fashion  of  Josephus.  But 
the  spirit  of  it  is  perfectly  just  and 
applies  to  the  Bible  generally.  Ba¬ 
laam  was  no  more  a  member  of  the 
Jewish  Church  than  was  Socrates. 
He  was  as  great  an  enemy  of  the 
Church  as  Julian.  But  not  the  less 
has  the  sacred  historian  done  that  jus¬ 
tice  to  the  alien  and  the  enemy,  which 
many  Christian  theologians  have  made 
it  a  point  of  honor  to  deny. 


Lect.  VIII. 


BALAAM. 


211 


delineated  with  that  fineness  of  touch  which  has  ren¬ 
dered  it  the  storehouse  of  theologians  and  mor-  His  char_ 
alists  in  the  most  recent  ages  of  the  Church.  acter‘ 
Three  great  divines  have  from  different  points  of  view 
drawn  out,  without  exhausting,  the  subtle  phases  of 
his  greatness  and  of  his  fall.  The  self-deception  which 
persuades  him  in  every  case  that  the  sin  which  he  com¬ 
mits  may  he  brought  within  the  rules  of  conscience 
and  revelation ; 1  the  dark  shade  cast  over  a  noble 
course  by  standing  always  on  the  ladder  of  advance¬ 
ment,  and  by  the  suspense  of  a  worldly  ambition  never 
satisfied ; 2  the  combination  of  the  purest  form  of  re¬ 
ligious  belief  with  a  standard  of  action  immeasurably 
below8  it;  these  have  given  to  the  story  of  Balaam, 
the  son  of  Beor,  a  hold  over  the  last  hundred  years, 
which  it  never  can  have  had  over  any  period  of  the 
human  mind  less  critical  or  less  refined. 

One  feels  a  kind  of  awe  in  the  gradual  preparation, 
with  which  he  is  brought  before  us,  as  if  in  the  fore¬ 
boding  of  some  great  catastrophe.  The  King  of  the 
civilized  Moabites  unites  with  the  Elders,  or  Sheiks, 
of  the  Bedouin  Midianites,  to  seek  for  aid  against  the 
powerful  nation  who  (to  use  their  own  peculiarly  pas¬ 
toral  image)  “  licked  up  all  that  were  round  about 
“  them,  as  the  ox  licked  up  the  grass  of  the  field  ” 4 
of  Moab.  Twice,  across  the  whole  length  of  the  As¬ 
syrian  desert,  the  messengers,  with  the  Oriental  bribes 
of  divination  in  their  hands,  are  sent  to  conjure  forth 
the  mighty  seer  from  his  distant  home.5  In  the  per¬ 
mission  to  go  when,  once  refused,  he  presses  for  a 
favorable  answer,  which  at  last  comes,  though  leading 

1  Butler’s  Sermons ,  vii.  5  Compare,  for  this  extended  inter- 

2  Newman’s  Sermons ,  iv.  21.  course  between  such  distant  localities, 

3  Arnold’s  Sermons,  vi.  55,  56.  Blunt’s  Coincidences,  Pt.  I.  §  xxiii. 

4  Num.  xxii.  4. 


« 


212 


PISGAH. 


Lect.  VIII. 


him  to  ruin,  we  see  the  peculiar  turn  of  teaching 
which  characterizes  the  purest  of  the  ancient  heathen 
oracles.  It  is  the  exact  counterpart  of  the  elevated 
rebuke  of  the  Oracle  at  Cumae  to  Aristodicus,  and  of 
His  jour-  the  Oracle  of  Delphi  to  Glaucus!  Reluctantly, 
ney*  at  last  he  comes.  The  dreadful  apparition  on 
the  way,  the  desperate  resistance  of  the  terrified  ani¬ 
mal,  the  furious  determination  of  the  Prophet  to  ad¬ 
vance,  the  voice,  however  explained,2  which  breaks  from 
the  dumb  creature  that  has  saved  his  life,  all  heighten 
The  first  the  expectation  of  the  message  that  he  is  to 
of1  Baia am  deliver.  When  Balaam  and  Balak  first  meet, 
and  Baiak.  sh0rt  dialogue,  preserved  not  by  the  Mosaic 

historian  but  by  the  Prophet  Micah,3  at  once  exhibits 
the  agony  of  the  King  and  the  lofty  conceptions  of 
the  great  seer.  “  0  my  people,  remember  what  Ba- 
“  lak,  king  of  Moab,  consulted,  and  what  Balaam,  the 
“  son  of  Beor,  answered.  c  Wherewith  shall  I  come  before 
“  ‘  the  Lord ,  and  bow  myself  before  the  High  God  ?  Shall 
“  ‘  I  come  before  Him  with  burnt  offerings ,  with  calves  of  a 
“ ‘  year  old  ?  Will  the  Lord  be  pleased  with  thousands  of 
“‘rams,  or  with  ten  thousands  of  rivers  of  oil ?  Shall  I 
“  ‘  give  my  first-born  for  my  transgression,  the  fruit  of  my 
“  ‘  body  for  the  sin  of  my  soul  ?  ’  ”  So  speaks  the  super¬ 
stitious  feeling  of  all  times,  but,  in  a  peculiar  sense, 
of  the  royal  house  of  Moab,  always  ready,  in  a  na¬ 
tional  crisis,  to  appease  offended  Heaven  by  the  sacri¬ 
fice  4  of  the  heir  to  the  throne.  The  reply  is  such  as 


1  Herod,  i.  53,  55  ;  vi.  85  ;  compare 
1  Kings  xxii.  22  ;  Ezek.  xiv.  5. 

2  Hengstenberg  ( GescMchte  Bile- 
ams ,  50-54)  represents  it  as  a  dream 
or  trance. 

3  Micah  vi.  5,  &c. 

4  Comp.  2  Kings  iii.  27  (see  Mr. 


Grove  on  “  Moab  ”  in  Diet,  of  Bible). 
This  coincidence  seems  of  itself  suffi¬ 
cient  to  show  that  this  passage  of  Mi¬ 
cah  vi.  is  not,  as  some  have  supposed, 
a  merely  general  statement,  but  is  in¬ 
tended  for  the  dialogue  between  Ba¬ 
laam  and  Balak. 


Lect.  VIII. 


BALAAM. 


213 


breathes  the  very  essence  of  the  Prophetic  spirit,  such 
as  had  at  that  early  time  hardly  expressed  itself  dis¬ 
tinctly  even  within  the  Mosaic  Revelation  itself.  “  He 
u  hath  showed  thee,  0  man ,  what  is  good  ;  and  what  doth  the 
“  Lord  require  of  thee  but  to  do  justly,  and  to  love  mercy ,  and 
“  to  walk  humbly  with  thy  God .” 

If  this  is,  indeed,  intended  to  describe  the  first 
meeting  of  the  King  and  the  Seer,  it  en-  The  divi_ 
hances  the  pathos  of  the  struggle  which  con-  natlons- 
tinues  through  each  successive  interview.  Sometimes 
the  one  only,  sometimes  both  together,  are  seen  striv¬ 
ing  to  overpower  the  voice  of  conscience  and  of  God 
with  the  fumes  of  sacrifice,  yet  always  failing  in  the 
attempt,  which  the  Prophet  had  himself  at  the  outset 
declared  to  be  vain.  The  eye  follows  the  Two,  as 
they  climb  upwards  from  height  to  height  along  the 
extended  range,  to  the  66  high  places  ” 1  dedicated 
to  Baal,  on  the  a  top  of  the  rocks,”  — ct  the  bare 
hill”2  close  above  it,  —  the  u  cultivated  field”3  of  the 
Watchmen  (Zophim)  on  the  top  of  Pisgah,4  —  to  the 
peak  where  stood  “  the  sanctuary  of  Peor,  that  looketh 
toward  the  waste.”  It  is  at  this  point  that  the 

scene  has  been  caught  in  the  well-known  lines  of  the 
poet,  — 

“  Oh  for  a  sculptor’s  hand 
That  thou  mightst  take  thy  stand, 

Thy  wild  hair  floating  on  the  eastern  breeze, 

Thy  tranc’d  yet  open  gaze 
Fix’d  on  the  desert  haze, 

As  one  who  deep  in  heav’n  some  airy  pageant  sees. 

“  In  outline  dim  and  vast 
Their  fearful  shadows  cast, 


1  Bamoth ,  Num.  xxii.  41. 

2  Sheji,  lb.  xxiii.  3,  9. 


3  Sadeh,  lb.  xxiii.  14. 

4  Num.  xxiii.  28;  Deut.  xxxiv.  1. 


214 


PISGAH. 


Lect.  Till. 


The  giant  forms  of  Empire  on  their  way 
To  ruin  :  one  by  one 
They  tow’r  and  they  are  gone. 

Yet  in  the  Prophet’s  soul  the  dreams  of  avarice  stay.”1 


Behind  him  lay  the  vast  expanse  of  desert  extend¬ 
ing  to  the  shores  of  his  native  Assyrian  river.  On 
his  left  were  the  red  mountains  of  Edom  and  Seir : 
opposite  were  the  dwelling-places  of  the  Kenite,  in 
the  rocky  fastnesses  of  Engedi ;  further  still  was  the 
dim  outline  of  the  Arabian  wilderness,  where  ruled 
the  then  powerful  tribe  of  Amalek ;  immediately  be¬ 
low  him  lay  the  vast  encampment  of  Israel,  amongst 
the  acacia  groves  of  Abel  Shittim,  —  like  the  water¬ 
courses  of  the  mountains,2  like  the  hanging  gardens 
beside  his  own  river  Euphrates,3  with  their  aromatic 
shrubs,  and  their  wide-spreading  cedars.  Beyond 
them,  on  the  western  side  of  Jordan,  rose  the  hills 
of  Palestine,  with  glimpses  through  their  valleys  o  ' 
ancient  cities  towering  on  their  crested  heights.  And 
beyond  all,  though  he  could  not  see  it  with  his  bodily 
vision,  he  knew  well  that  there  rolled  the  deep  waters 
of  the  great  sea,  with  the  Isles  of  Greece,  the  Isle  of 
Chittim,  —  a  world  of  which  the  first  beginnings  of 
life  were  just  stirring,,  of  which  the  very  name  here 
first  breaks  upon  our  ears. 

These  are  the  points  indicated  in  the  view  which 
lay  before  the  Prophet  as  he  stood  on  the  Watchers’ 
Field,  on  the  top  of  Pisgah.  What  was  the  vision 
which  unrolled  itself  as  he  heard  the  words  of  God, 
as  he  saw  the  vision  of  the  Almighty,  u  falling  ” 4  pros¬ 
trate  in  the  prophetic  trance,  “  but  having  the  eyes  ” 

1  Keble’s  Christian  Year ,  2d  Sun-  3  Nahar  (Ibid.) 
day  after  Easter.  4  The  same  word  as  in  1  Sam.  xix. 

8  Nachal,  Num.  xxiv.  6.  24;  comp.  Jos.  Ant.  iv.  6,  §  12. 


Lect.  VIII. 


BALAAM. 


215 


of  his  mind  and  his  spirit  "open”?  The  outward 
forms  still  remained.  He  still  saw  the  tents  below, 
goodly  in  their  array;  he  still  saw  the  rocks,  and 
hills,  and  distant  desert :  but,  as  his  thought  glanced 
from  height  to  height,  and  from  valley  to  mountain, 
the  future  fortunes  of  the  nations  who  dwelt  there 
unfolded  themselves  in  dim  succession,  revolving  round 
and  from  the  same  central  object. 

From  the  midst  of  that  vast  encampment  he  seemed 
to  see  streams,  as  of  w^ater  flowing  to  and  fro  The  vision, 
over  the  valleys,  giving  life  to  the  dry  desert  and  to 
the  salt  sea.1  He  seemed  to  see  a  form  as  of  a 
mighty  lion  couched  amidst  the  thickets,2  or  on  the 
mountain  fastnesses  of  Judah,  "  and  none  should  rouse 
"  him  up ;  ”  or  the  "  wild  bull  ” 3  raging  from  amidst 
the  archers  of  Ephraim,  trampling  down  his  enemies, 
piercing  them  through  with  the  well-known  arrows 4  of 
the  tribe.  And  yet  again,  in  the  more  distant  future, 
he  "saw,  but  not  now,”  —  he  "beheld,  but  not  nigh,” 
—  as  with  the  intuition  of  his  Chaldsean  art,  —  "a 
"  Star,”  bright  as  those  of  the  far  Eastern  sky,  "  come 
"  out  of  Jacob ;  ”  and  "  a  sceptre,”  like  the  shepherd’s 
staff  that  marked  the  ruler  of  the  tribe,  "  rise  out  of 
"  Israel :  ”  and  then,  as  he  watched  the  course  of  the 
surrounding  nations,  he  saw  how,  one  by  one,  they 
would  fall,  as  fall  they  did,  before  the  conquering 
sceptre  of  David,  before  the  steady  advance  of  that 
Star  which  then,  for  the  first  time,  rose  out  of  Beth¬ 
lehem.  And,  as  he  gazed,  the  vision  became  wider 
and  wider  still.  He  saw  a  time  when  a  new  tem¬ 
pest  would  break  over  all  these  countries  alike, 
from  the  remote  east,  —  from  Assur,  from  his  own 

1  Nurn.  xxiv.  7,  as  in  Ezek.  xlvii.  8.  3  Ibid.  8,  Auth.  Vers.  “  unicorn.” 

2  Ibid.  9.  4  Compare  Ps.  Ixxviii.  9. 


216 


PISGAH. 


Lect.  VIII 


native  land  of  Assyria.  “  Assur  shall  carry  thee 
“  away  captive.”  But  at  that  word  another  scene 
opened  before  him,  and  a  cry  of  horror  burst  from 
his  lips :  “  Alas !  who  shall  live  when  God  doeth  this !  ” 
For  his  own  nation,  too,  was  to  be  at  last  overtaken. 
“For  ships  shall  come  from  the  coast  of  Chittim,”  — 
from  the  island  of  Cyprus,  which,  as  the  only  one 
visible  from  the  heights  of  Palestine,  was  the  one 
familiar  link  with  the  western  world  —  “and  shall 
“  crush  Assur,  and  shall  crush  Eber,  ‘  the  people  be- 
“‘yond  the  Euphrates/  and  he  also  shall  perish  for 
“  ever.” 

So  it  came  to  pass,  when  the  ships  of  Cyprus,  of 
Greece,  of  Europe,  then  just  seen  in  the  horizon  of 
human 1  hopes  and  fears,  did  at  last,  under  the  great 
Macedonian  conqueror,  turn  the  tide  of  eastern  in¬ 
vasion  backwards;  and  Asshur  and  Babylon,  Assyria 
and  Chaldaea,  and  Persia,  no  less  than  the  wild 
hordes  of  the  desert,  “  perished  for  ever  ”  from  the 
earth.2 

It  has  often  been  debated,  and  no  evidence  now 
remains  to  prove,  at  what  precise  time  this  grandest 
of  all  its  episodes  was  introduced  into  the  Mosaic  nar¬ 
rative.  But,  however  this  may  be  determined,  the 
magnificence  of  the  vision  remains  untouched;  and  it 
stands  in  the  Sacred  record,  the  first  example  of  the 


1  The  earliest  known  event  to  which 
this  could  refer  was  the  attack  on  the 
colony  of  Sardanapalus  in  Cilicia  by 
the  Cyprian  fleet.  Euseb.  Chron.  Arm. 
i.  pp.  26,  27.  For  the  general  relations 
of  Cyprus  to  the  East  see  Sharpe. 

2  For  “  ships  of  Chittim”  the  Vul¬ 
gate  reads  “  galleys  from  Italy.”  The 
general  sense  of  “  the  West”  is  still 


preserved.  But  the  exchange  of  the 
familiar  island  of  Cyprus  for  the 
country,  at  that  time  unknown  and 
unintelligible  to  the  East,  of  Italy , 
well  illustrates  the  difference  between 
Prophecy  as  it  appears  in  the  Bible, 
and  as  it  appears  in  the  theories  of 
later  ages.  See  Lecture  XX. 


Lect.  VIII. 


BALAAM. 


217 


Prophetic  utterances  respecting  the  destinies  of  the 
world  at  large;  founded,  like  all  such  utterances,  on 
the  objects  immediately  in  the  range  of  the  vision  of 
the  seer,  but  including  within  their  swTeep  a  vast 
prospect  beyond.  Here  first  the  Gentile  world,  not 
of  the  East  only  but  of  the  West,  bursts  into  view ; 
and  here  is  the  first  sanction  of  that  wide  interest  in 
the  various  races  and  empires  of  mankind,  not  only 
as  bearing  on  the  fortunes  of  the  Chosen  People,  but 
for  their  own  sakes  also,  which  the  narrow  spirits  of 
the  Jewish  Church  first,  and  of  the  Christian  Church 
since,  have  been  so  slow  to  acknowledge.  Here,  too, 
is  exhibited  in  its  most  striking  form  the  irresistible 
force  of  the  Prophetic  impulse  overpowering  the  baser 
spirit  of  the  individual  man.  The  spectacle  of  the 
host  of  Israel,  even  though  seen  only  from  its  utmost 
skirts,  is  too  much  for  him.  The  Divine  message 
struggling  within  him,  is  delivered  in  spite  of  his  own 
sordid  resistance.  Many  has  been  the  Balaam  whom 
the  force  of  truth  or  goodness  from  without,  or  the 
force  of  genius  or  conscience  from  within,  has  com¬ 
pelled  to  bless  the  enemies  whom  he  was  hired  to 
curse. 

“  Like  the  seer  of  old, 

Who  stood  on  Zophim,  heav’n-controll’d.” 

“And  Balaam  rose  up  and  went  and  returned  to 
“his  own  place.”  The  Sacred  historian,  as  if  touched 
with  a  feeling  of  the  greatness  of  the  Prophet’s  mis¬ 
sion,  drops  the  veil  over  its  dark  close.  Only  by  the 
incidental  notice1  of  a  subsequent  part  of  the  narra¬ 
tive,  are  we  told  how  Balaam  endeavored  to  effect2 

1  Josephus  amplifies  the  single  word  elaborate  embassy  to  the  Euphrates.  — • 
ef  the  Biblical  narrative  into  another  Ant.  iv.  6,  §  5-8. 

2  Num.  xxxi.  8,  16. 


28 


218 


KADESH  AND  PISGAH. 


Lect.  YIIL 


Farewell 
of  Moses, 


by  the  licentious  rites  of  the  Arab  tribes,  the  ruin 
which  he  had  been  unable  to  work  by  his  curses ; 
and  how,  in  the  war  of  vengeance  which  followed,  he 
met  with  his  mournful  end. 

2.  The  intermingling  of  the  narratives  of  the  Book 
of  Numbers,  the  Book  of  Deuteronomy,  the 
Book  of  Joshua ;  the  rise  of  new  names, 
Eleazar,  Phineas,  Jair;  indicate  that  we  are  approach¬ 
ing  the  confines  of  another  generation,  and  another 
stage  of  the  history.  But  the  main  interest  still 
hangs  round  Moses,  and  round  the  heights  of  Pisgah. 
We  need  not  here  discuss  the  vexed  question  of  the 
DeUter-  precise  time  when  the  Book  of  Deuteronomy1 

°n°my.  assumed  its  present  form.  It  is  enough  to 

feel  that  it  represents  to  us  the  long  farewrell  of  the 
Prophet  and  Lawgiver,  as  he  stood  amongst  the  groves 
of  Abel  Shittim,  and  recapitulated  the  course  of  his 
career  and  of  his  legislation.  Parts,  at  least,  have 
every  appearance  of  belonging  to  that  stage  of  the 
history  and  to  no  other ;  when  they  were  still  beyond 
the  Jordan,  when  the  institutions  of  the  conquest  and 
the  monarchy  were  still  undeveloped.  And,  if  the 
features  of  the  earlier  law  are  from  time  to  time 
transfigured  with  a  softer  and  a  more  spiritual  light, 
this  change,  whilst  it  may  have  received  some  touches 
from  the  later  spirit  of  the  great  Prophetic  age,  yet 
is  also  in  close  harmony  —  it  may  be,  dramatic  har¬ 
mony  —  with  the  soothing  and  widening  process  which 
belongs  to  the  old  age,  not  merely  of  every  nation, 
but  of  every  individual.  Deuteronomy  has  been  soine- 


1  At  the  time  of  the  Christian  era,  8,  §  48  ;  Phil.  V.  M.  iii.  39.)  This  hy- 
and  probably  long  afterwards,  the  ac-  pothesis  is  worth  recording  as  an  ex¬ 
count  of  the  death  and  burial  of  Moses  ample  of  interpretation  now  entirely 
was  supposed  to  have  been  written  by  superseded, 
himself  as  a  prediction.  (Jos.  Ant.  iv. 


Lect.  YIII. 


FAREWELL  OF  MOSES. 


219 


times  said  to  be  to  the  earlier  books  of  the  Law,  as  the 
Fourth  Gospel  to  the  earlier  Three.  The  comparison 
may  hold  good  in  regard  no  less  to  the  actual  advance 
in  the  character  of  Moses  the  Lawgiver  and  Moses 
the  expiring  Prophet,  -and  the  character  of  the  Son 
of  Thunder  and  the  aged  Evangelist. 

In  this  last  representation  of  Moses,  one  feature  is 
brought  out  more  forcibly  than  ever  before.  The 
poetic  utterances,  regarded  as  an  indispensable  accom¬ 
paniment  of  the  prophetic  gift,  now  come  forth  in 
full  strength ;  the  vox  cycnea  of  the  departing  seer. 

Two  of  these,  at  least  in  their  general  conception, 
belong  exclusively  to  this  epoch,  the  Eve  of  The  two 
the  Conquest :  the  Song  of  battle  and  of  warn-  Moses, 
ing  by  which  Joshua  was  to  be  cheered,  and  the 
Blessing,  it  might  almost  be  said  the  war-cry,  of  the 
several  tribes.  In  some  minute  points,  also,  we  seem 
to  trace  the  feeling  of  this  particular  crisis  of  the  his¬ 
tory.  The  name  by  which,  in  the  Song  of  Moses,  the 
God  of  Israel  is  called,  must,  in  the  first  instance, 
have  been  suggested  by  the  Desert-wanderings, — 
“  The  Rock.”  Nine  times  in  the  course  of  this  single 
Hymn  is  repeated  this  most  expressive  figure,  taken 
from  the  granite  crags  of  Sinai,  and  carried  thence, 
through  psalms  and  hj^mns  of  all  nations,  like  one  of 
the  huge  fragments  which  it  represents,  to  regions  as 
remote  in  aspect  as  in  distance,  from  its  original  birth¬ 
place.  If  “  The  Rock  ”  carries  us  back  to  the  desert, 
the  pastoral  riches  to  which  the  Song  refers  confine 
us  to  the  eastern  bank  of  the  Jordan.  “The  butter 
“  of  kine,  and  milk  of  sheep,  with  fat  of  lambs,  and 
“rams  of  the  breed  of  Bashan,  and  goats,  with  the 
*  fat  of  kidneys  of  wheat.” 1  It  would  be  too  bold  to 

1  Deut.  xxxii.  13,  14. 


220 


KADESH  AND  PISGAH. 


Lect.  Yin. 


say  that  these  words  could  not  have  occurred  to  any 
one  in  Western  Palestine;  hut  they  are  so  far  more 
appropriate  to  the  Eastern  downs  and  forests,  that 
we  may  fairly  see  in  them  a  stamp  of  that  peculiar 
locality. 

The  third  hymn,  which,  by  its  title,  belongs  to  this 
The  Prayer  period,  is  of  far  more  universal  interest, 
of  Moses.  “  The  Prayer  of  Moses  the  man  of  God  ” 1 
which  contrasts  the  fleeting  generations  of  man  with 
the  mountains  at  whose  feet  they  wandered,  and  the 
eternity  of  Him  who  existed  “  before  ever  those 
mountains  were  brought  forth,”  has  become  the  fune¬ 
ral  hymn  of  the  world,  and  is  evidently  intended  to 
he  treated  as  the  funeral  hymn  of  the  Prophet  him¬ 
self.  The  most  recent  criticism,  whilst  hesitating  to 
receive  it  as  actually  the  composition  of  Moses,  re¬ 
joices  to  see  in  it  his  spirit  throughout.  “  The  Psalm 
“  has  something  in  it  unusually  arresting,  solemn,  and 
“  sinking  deep  into  the  depths  of  the  Divinity.  Moses 
“  might  well  have  been  seized  by  these  awful  thoughts 
“  at  the  close  of  his  wanderings,  and  the  author,  who- 
66  ever  he  be,  is  clearly  a  man  grown  gray  with  vast 
“  experience,  who  here  takes  his  stand  at  the  end  of 
“  his  earthly  course.” 2 

The  end  was  at  last  come.  It  might  still  have 
The  last  seemed  that  a  triumphant  close  was  in  store 
pisgah.  for  the  aged  Prophet.  “  His  eye  was  not  dim 
nor  his  natural  force  abated.”  He  had  led  his  people 
to  victory  against  the  Amorite  kings ;  he  might  still  be 
expected  to  lead  them  over  into  the  land  of  Canaan. 
But  so  it  was  not  to  be.  From  the  desert  plains  of 
Moab  he  went  up  to  the  same  lofty  range  whence 
Balaam  had  looked  over  the  same  prospect.  The 

1  Ps.  xc.  2  Ewald,  Psalmen,  91. 


Lect.  VIII. 


THE  LAST  VIEW  FROM  PISGAH. 


221 


same,  but  seen  with  eyes  how  different !  The  view 
of  Balaam  has  been  long  forgotten;  but  the  view  of 
Moses  had  become  the  proverbial  view  of  all  time. 
It  was  the  peak  dedicated  to  Nebo  on  which  he  stood. 
“  He  lifted  up  his  eyes  westward,  and  northward,  and 
u  southward,  and  eastward.” 1  Beneath  him  lay  the 
tents  of  Israel  ready  for  the  march ;  and  “  over  against  ” 
them,  distinctly  visible  in  its  grove  of  palm-trees,  the 
stately  Jericho,  key  of  the  Land  of  Promise.  Beyond 
was  spread  out  the  whole  range  of  the  mountains  of 
Palestine,  in  its  fourfold  masses ;  “  all  Gilead,”  with 
Hermon  and  Lebanon  in  the  east  and  north ;  the  hills 
of  Galilee,  overhanging  the  Lake  of  Gennesareth ;  the 
wide  opening  where  lay  the  plain  of  Esdraelon,  the 
future  battle-field  of  the  nations ;  the  rounded  summits 
of  Ebal  and  Gerizim ;  immediately  in  front  of  him  the 
hills  of  Judsea,  and,  amidst  them,  seen  distinctly  through 
the  rents  in  their  rocky  walls,  Bethlehem  on  its  nar¬ 
row  ridge,  and  the  invincible  fortress  of  Jebus.  To 
him,  so  far  as  we  know,  the  charm  of  that  view  — 
pronounced  by  the  few  modern  travellers  who  have 
seen  it  to  be  unequalled  of  its  kind  —  lay  in  the  as¬ 
surance  that  this  was  the  land  promised  to  Abraham, 
to  Isaac,  and  to  Jacob,  and  to  their  seed,  the  inheri¬ 
tance —  with  all  its  varied  features  of  rock  and  pas¬ 
ture,  and  forest  and  desert  —  for  the  sake  of  which  he 
had  borne  so  many  years  of  toil  and  danger,  in  the 
midst  of  which  the  fortunes  of  his  people  would  be 
unfolded  worthily  of  that  great  beginning.  To  us,  as 
we  place  ourselves  by  his  side,  the  view  swells  into 
colossal  proportions,  as  we  think  how  the  proud  city 
of  palm-trees  is  to  fall  before  the  hosts  of  Israel ;  how 
the  spear  of  Joshua  is  to  be  planted  on  height  after 


1  Deut  iii.  27. 


222 


KADESH  AND  FISGAH. 


Lect.  yin. 


height  of  those  hostile  mountains ;  what  series  of 
events,  wonderful  beyond  any  that  had  been  witnessed 
in  Egypt  or  in  Sinai,  would  in  after-ages  be  enacted 
on  the  narrow  crest  of  Bethlehem,  in  the  deep  basin 
of  the  Galilean  lake,  beneath  the  walls  of  "Jebus, 
"  which  is  Jerusalem.” 

All  this  he  saw.  He  "  saw  it  with  his  eyes,  but  he 
"  was  not  to  go  over  thither.”  It  was  his  last  view. 
From  that  height  he  came  down  no  more.  Jewish, 
Mussulman,  and  Christian  traditions  crowd  in  to  fill 
up  the  blank.  "  Amidst  the  tears  of  the  people,  the 
"  women  beating  their  breasts  and  the  children  giv¬ 
ing  way  to  uncontrolled  wailing,  he  withdrew.  At 
"a  certain  point  in  his  ascent  he  made  a  sign  to  the 
"  weeping  multitude  to  advance  no  further,  taking 
"with  him  only  the  elders,  the  high  priest  Eliezer, 
"and  the  general  Joshua.  At  the  top  of  the  moun¬ 
tain  he  dismissed  the  elders,  and  then,  as  he  was 
"embracing  Eliezer  and  Joshua,  and  still  speaking  to 
"them,  a  cloud  suddenly  stood  over  him,  and  he  van¬ 
ished  in  a  deep  valley.”  So  spoke  the  tradition  as 
preserved  in  the  language,  here  unusually  pathetic, 
of  Josephus.  Other  wilder  stories  told  of  the  Divine 
kiss  which  drew  forth  his  expiring  spirit;  others  of 
the  "  Ascension  of  Moses  ”  amidst  the  contention  of 
good  and  evil  spirits  over  his  body.1  The  Mussul¬ 
mans,  regardless  of  the  actual  scene  of  his  death,  have 
raised  to  him  a  tomb  on  the  western  side  of  the  Jor¬ 
dan,  frequented  by  thousands  of  Mussulman  devotees. 
But  the  silence  of  the  Sacred  narrative  refuses  to  be 
broken.  "In”  that  strange  land,  "the  land  of  Moab, 
"  Moses  the  servant  of  the  Lord  died  according  to 
"  the  word  of  the  Lord.”  "  He  buried  him  in  ‘  a  ra- 

1  Jude  9.  Fabricius,  Cod.  Pseudep.  i.  839-846. 


Lect.  VIII. 


THE  END  OF  MOSES. 


223 


“  vine  ’  in  the  land  of  Moab,  over  against  the  idol 
“temple  of  Peor.”  Apart  from  his  countrymen,  hon¬ 
ored  by  no  funeral  obsequies,  visited  by  no  grateful 
pilgrimages,  “no  man  knoweth  of  his  sepulchre  unto 
“this  day”* 

Two  impressive  truths  are  involved  in  this  repre¬ 
sentation  of  the  death  of  Moses,  truths  which  hardly 
occur  again  with  equal  force  in  the  history  till  we 
meet  them  again  in  the  end  of  Him,  of  whom,  in 
the  New  Testament,  Moses  is  so  often  made  the  illus¬ 
tration  and  likeness.  First,- the  mystery,  theThegrave 
uncertainty,  which  overhangs  the  burial-place  of  Moses* 
of  the  greatest  character  of  the  Jewish  Church,  is  a 
sample  of  the  general  feeling  with  which  these  local 
sanctuaries  were  regarded.  Doubtless,  as  in  the  case 
of  the  Patriarchal  sepulchres  at  Hebron,  and  the 
royal  sepulchres  at  Jerusalem,  the  natural  instinct  of 
reverence  for  the  tombs  of  the  illustrious  dead,  often 
asserted  its  own  rights.  But,  as  if  to  show  that  this 
is  a  secondary  and  not  a  primary  element  of  relig¬ 
ious  sentiment,  when  we  come  to  the  highest  cases 
of  all,  the  grave  on  Mount  Nebo,  the  grave  on  Gol¬ 
gotha,  the  darkness  closes  upon  the  sacred  spot :  “  no 
man  knoweth  of  his  sepulchre  until  this  day.” 

Secondly,  the  scene  on  Pisgah  is  at  once  the  fitting 
end  of  the  life  of  Moses,  and  the  exemplifica-  The  End  o, 
tion  of  a  general  law.  In  one  sense  it  might  Moses* 
seem  mournful,  incomplete,  disappointing;  but  in  an¬ 
other  and  higher  sense,  how  fully  in  accordance  with 
his  whole  career,  how  truly  the  crowning  point  of  his 
life! 

The  personal  characteristics  of  the  Prophet  are  too 
faintly  drawn  to  admit  of  any  fuller  delineation.  But 
one  feature  is  indisputably  marked  out.  No  modern 


224 


KADESH  AND  PISGAH. 


Lect.  VIII. 


word  seems  exactly  to  correspond  to  that  which  our 
translators  have  rendered  a  the  meekest  of  men,”  — 

i  ‘  i 

but  which  rather  expresses  “  enduring,”  “  afflicted,” 
“  heedless  of  self”  This  at  any  rate  is  the  trait  most 
strongly  impressed  on  all  his  actions  from  first  to 
last.  So  in  Egypt  he  threw  himself  into  the  thank¬ 
less  cause  of  his  oppressed  brethren ;  at  his  earliest 
call  he  prayed  that  Aaron  might  be  the  leader  in¬ 
stead  of  himself;  at  Sinai  he  besought  that  his  name 
might  be  blotted  out  if  only  his  people  might  be 
spared;  in  the  desert,  he  wished  that  not  only  he, 
but  all  the  Lord’s  people  might  prophesy.  He  found¬ 
ed  no  dynasty;  his  own  sons  were  left  in  deep  ob¬ 
scurity;  his  successor  was  taken  from  the  rival  tribe 
of  Ephraim.  He  himself  receives  for  once  the  regal 
title  “the  King1  in  Jeshurun;”  but  the  title  dies 
with  him.  It  is  as  the  highest  type  and  concentra¬ 
tion  of  this  endurance  and  self-abnegation,  that  the 
last  view  from  Pisgah  receives  its  chief  instruction. 

To  labor  and  not  to  see  the  end  of  our  labors ;  to 
sow  and  not  to  reap ;  to  be  removed  from  this  earthly 
scene  before  our  work  has  been  appreciated,  and  when 
it  will  be  carried  on  not  by  ourselves,  but  by  others, 
—  is  a  law  so  common  in  the  highest  characters  of 
history,  that  none  can  be  said  to  be  altogether  ex¬ 
empt  from  its  operation.  It  is  true  in  intellectual 
matters  as  well  as  in  spiritual;  and  one  of  the  finest 
applications  of  any  passage  in  the  Mosaic  history,  is 
that  made  by  Cowley,  and  extended  by  Lord  Macau- 
ley  to  the  great  English  philosopher,  who  — 

“  Did  on  the  very  border  stand 
Of  the  blessed  Promised  Land ; 


1  Deut.  xxxiii.  5. 


Lect.  Yin. 


THE  END  OF  MOSES. 


225 


And  from  the  mountain’s  top  of  his  exalted  wit 
Saw  it  himself,  and  show’d  us  it ; 

But  life  did  never  to  one  man  allow 
Time  to  discover  worlds  and  conquer  too.” 


“In  the  first  book  of  the  Novum  Organum  we  see 
“the  great  Lawgiver  looking  round  from  his  lonely 
“  elevation  on  an  infinite  expanse ;  behind  him  a  wil- 
“  derness  of  dreary  sands  and  bitter  waters,  in  which 
“  successive  generations  have  sojourned,  always  mov- 
“ing,  yet  never  advancing,  reaping  no  harvest  and 
“  building  no  abiding  city :  before  him  a  goodly  land, 
“a  land  of  promise,  a  land  flowing  with  milk  and 
“  honey.  While  the  multitude  below  saw  only  the 
“  flat  sterile  desert  in  which  they  had  so  long  wan- 
“  dered,  bounded  on  every  side  by  a  near  horizon,  or 
“  diversified  only  by  some  deceitful  mirage,  he  was 
“  gazing  from  a  far  higher  stand,  on  a  far  lovelier 
“  country,  following  with  his  eye  the  long  course  of 
“  fertilizing  rivers,  through  ample  pastures,  and  under 
“  the  bridges  of  great  capitals,  measuring  the  dis- 
“  tances  of  marts  and  barns,  and  portioning  out  all 
“  these  wealthy  regions  from  Dan  to  Beersheba.” 1 

The  imagery  thus  nobly  used  to  describe  the  prom¬ 
ise  and  the  self-denial  of  intellectual  labor,  is  still 
more  true  of  the  many  reformers,  martyrs,  and  mis¬ 
sionaries,  John  Huss,  Tyndale,  Francis  Xavier,  How¬ 
ard,  who,  in  all  times  of  the  Church,  have  died  on 
the  threshold  of  their  reward,  in  hope,  not  in  posses¬ 
sion.  Events  have  moved  too  slow,  and  the  genera¬ 
tion  passes  away  which  should  have  supported  the 
saint  or  the  chief;  or  events  have  moved  too  fast, 
and  the  rising  generation  has  superseded  the  want 
of  a  leader;  or  a  word  has  been  spoken  unadvisedly 

1  Macaulay’s  Essays,  vol.  iii.  p.  493. 

29 


226 


KADESH  AND  PISGAH. 


Lect.  VIII. 


with  his  lips,  and  his  prospects  are  suddenly  over¬ 
cast;  or  he  is  struck  by  decay  of  power,  or  by  sud¬ 
den,  untimely  death ;  again  and  again  the  Moses  of 
the  Church,  of  the  commonwealth,  lingers  there,  “  dies 
“  there  in  the  land  of  Moab,  and  goes  not  over  to 
“  possess  that  good  land ;  ”  and  Canaan  is  won,  not  by 
the  first  and  greatest  of  the  nation,  but  by  his  sub¬ 
ordinate  minister  and  successor,  Joshua  the  son  of 
Nun. 


THE  CONQUEST  OF  PALESTINE. 


IX.  THE  CONQUEST  OF  THE  EAST  OF  THE  JORDAN. 

X.  THE  CONQUEST  OF  WESTERN  PALESTINE.— THE  FALL 

OF  JERICHO  AND  AI. 

XL  THE  CONQUEST  OF  WESTERN  PALESTINE.— THE  BAT¬ 
TLE  OF  BETH-HORON. 

XH.  THE  CONQUEST  OF  WESTERN  PALESTINE.— THE  BAT¬ 
TLE  OF  MEROM,  AND  SETTLEMENT  OF  THE  TRIBES. 


THE  AUTHORITIES  FOR  THIS  PART  OF  THE  HISTORY. 


1.  (1.)  Num.  xxi.  21-35  ;  xxv.,  xxxi.,  xxxii.,  xxxiv. ;  Deut.  ii.  1 ;  iii. 

31;  iv.  41-49;  xxix.  7,  8;  Joshua  i.-xxiv.;  Judgl  i.  1-36;  xi. 
15-26 ;  xviii.  1-31 ;  1  Chron.  ii.  20-24.  (2.)  Ps.  xliv.  1-4 ; 
lxxviii.  55;  cxiv.  3,  5;  cxxxvi.  17-22;  Ecclus.  xlvi.  1-12. 
(3.)  The  Characteristics  of  the  tribes,  Gen.  xlix. ;  Deut.  xxxiii. 

2.  Jewish  traditions.  (1.)  Josephus,  Ant .  iv.  5,  6,  7  ;  v.  1.  (2.)  Rab¬ 

binical  legends,  in  Otho’s  Lex.  rabbin.  332  ;  Fabricius’s  Codex 
pseudepi graph.  Vet.  Test.  871-873.  (a.)  Joshua’s  Prayer. 
(b.)  Joshua’s  Ten  Decrees.  (3.)  Philo,  De  Caritate.  (4.)  Sa¬ 
maritan  Book  of  Joshua,  edited  by  Juynboll,  1848.  [It  was 
■written  in  Arabic  —  probably  in  the  12th  century  —  in  Egypt, 
and  is  chiefly  valuable  as  representing  the  traditions  and  feelings 
of  the  Samaritan  community.] 

3.  Heathen  traditions,  mentioned  by  Suidas  ( sub  voce  Xavaav)  ;  Moses 

Choren.  (Hist.  Arm.  i.  18) ;  Procopius  (Bell.  Vand.  ii.  4). 


THE  CONQUEST  OF  PALESTINE. 


LECTURE  IX. 

THE  CONQUEST  OF  THE  EAST  OF  THE  JORDAN. 

“  The  Conquest  of  Palestine  ”  introduces  us  to  one 
of  the  most  secular  portions  of  the  Sacred  The  Coll_ 
history.  The  very  phrase  is  to  some  minds  an  quest 
offence.  It  suggests  the  likeness  of  other  conquests. 
It  compels  us  to  regard  the  geography,  the  battles, 
the  settlement  of  Israel,  as  we  should  consider  the 
like  circumstances  in  other  countries.  Such  an  of¬ 
fence  is,  to  a  certain  degree,  inevitable.  But  this 
stage  of  the  history,  secular  as  it  is,  presents  also  a 
religious  aspect,  on  which,  according  to  the  plan  of 
these  Lectures,  it  will  he  my  object  to  lay  the  chief 
stress,  though  not  to  the  omission  of  those  general 
considerations  which  here,  as  in  other  ecclesiastical 
history,  are  necessary  to  the  understanding  of  the 
purely  religious  incidents  intertwined  with  them. 

The  period  of  the  Conquest,  properly  speaking, 
commences  before  the  time  of  Joshua  and  its  stages, 
extends  far  beyond  it.  It  began  from  the  passage 
of  the  brook  Zered  under  Moses:  it  was  not  finally 
closed  till  the  capture  of  Jerusalem  by  David.  But, 
in  a  more  limited  sense,  it  may  be  confined  to  the 
period  during  which  the  territory,  afterwards  known 
by  the  name  of  Palestine,  was  definitively  occupied  as 


230 


CONQUEST  OF  THE  EAST  OF  JORDAN. 


Lect.  IX. 


their  own  by  the  Israelites.  This  divides  itself  into 
two  stages:  the  first,  including  the  occupation  of  the 
district  east  of  the  Jordan;  the  second,  and  most  im¬ 
portant,  including  the  occupation  of  Western  Pales¬ 
tine  in  its  three  great  divisions,  the  valley  of  the 
Jordan,  the  southern  and  central  mountains  after¬ 
wards  known  as  Judaea  and  Samaria,  and  the  north¬ 
ern  mountains  afterwards  known  as  Galilee. 

The  Israelite  conquest  of  Palestine,  although  it 
stands  above  all  other  like  events  from  its  intrinsic 
grandeur,  yet  is  in  itself  but  one  amongst  a  succes¬ 
sion  of  waves  which  have  swept  over  the  country, 
and  each  of  which  may  be  used  as  an  illustration  of 
those  that  have  gone  before  and  after.  The  Egyp¬ 
tians,  Assyrians,  Babylonians,  Greeks,  Eomans,  Ara¬ 
bians,  Turks,  Crusaders,  French,  English,  have  fol¬ 
lowed  in  their  wake ;  the  Philistines,  the  Canaanites, 
the  aboriginal  inhabitants,  accompanied  or  preceded 
them. 

It  is  of  these  earlier  conquests  alone  that  we  need 
The  eariv  here  speak.  The  aboriginal  inhabitants  have 
ofhWestem  already1  been  briefly  described.  They  be- 
Paiestme.  ]onge(j  so  entirely  to  the  dim  distance,  that 

their  name,  “  Rephaim,”  was  used  in  after-times  to 
designate  the  huge  guardians  or  the  shadowy  ghosts 2 
of  the  world  below.  But  we  can  just  discern  their 
forms  before  they  vanish,  and  some  remnants  of  them 
lingered  till  later  times.  Their  lofty  stature  is  often 
noticed.  It  is  possible  that  this  impression  may  be 
partly  derived  from  the  contrast  between  them  and 
the  diminutive  Hebrews,  in  like  manner  as  a  similar 
description,  from  the  like  contrast  between  the  north- 

1  Lecture  II.  10 ;  Prov.  ii.  18 ;  ix.  18 ;  xxi.  16 ;  Isa. 

2  See  Gesenius,  in  voce ;  Ps.  lxxxviii.  xxvi.  14,  19. 


Lect.  IX. 


THE  CANAANITES. 


231 


ern  races  of  Europe  and  the  small  limbs  and  features 
of  the  Italians,  is  given,  by  Koman  historians  and 
poets,  of  the  gigantic  Gauls.  On  the  west  of  the 
Jordan  this  race  appears  chiefly  under  two  names : 
the  “Anakim”  in  the  southern  mountains,  and  the 
“  Avites  ”  on  the  maritime  plain.1  The  centre  of  the 
race  of  Anak  was,  as  we  have  seen,  Hebron  or  Kir- 
jath-Arba.  The  Avites,  it  would  seem,  were  still  com¬ 
paratively  secure  in  their  western  corner.  Their  con¬ 
querors,  the  Philistines,2  had  not  yet  appeared ;  at 
least  not  in  any  overwhelming  force.  But  in  all  the 
rest  of  Palestine,  already  in  the  Patriarchal  The  Ca_ 
age  the  a  ancient  solitary  reign  ”  of  these  abo-  naamtes- 
riginal  tribes  had  been  disturbed  by  the  appearance 
here  and  there  of  powerful  chiefs  belonging  to  the 
Phoenician  or  Canaanite  branch  of  the  Semitic  race. 
The  variations  in  the  usage  of  the  words,  sometimes 
the  variations  of  the  text,  prevent  us  from  accurately 
fixing  the  mutual  relations  of  the  several  Canaanite 
tribes  to  each  other.  Thus  much,  however,  is  clear.3 
The  Canaanites,4  or  “  Lowlanders,”  properly  so  called, 
occupied  the  sea-coast  as  far  south  as  Dor,  a  consider¬ 
able  portion  of  the  plain  of  Esdraelon,  and  some  spots 
in  the  valley  of  the  Jordan.  The  Amorites,  or  moun¬ 
taineers,  occupied  the  central  and  southern  hills  with 
the  Hittites  and  Hivites.  Of  these  intruders,  the  Amo¬ 
rites  seem  to  have  been  the  most  ancient  and  the  most 
warlike,  perhaps  allied  to  the  old  gigantic  race  with 
which  from  time  to  time  they  appear  in  connection.5 
The  Hittites  belong  to  the  more  peaceful  occupants, 

1  Deut.  ii.  21,  23.  xiii.  29;  and  compare,  throughout, 

2  See  Lecture  XVI.  Ewald,  i.  301-342. 

2  The  most  exact  account  of  the  4  Deut.  i.  7. 

relations  of  these  tribes  is  in  Num.  5  Deut  iv.  47;  xxxi.  4;  Jos.  ix.  10; 

Amos  ii.  9. 


232 


CONQUEST  OF  THE  EAST  OF  JORDAN.  Lect.  IX. 


and  their  name  is  that  by  which  Palestine  in  these 
early  ages  was  chiefly  known  in  foreign  countries. 
The  Hivites,  like  the  Phoenicians  of  the  north,  in¬ 
clined  to  a  more  regular  form  of  political  organization. 
Of  the  lesser  subdivisions,  the  Jebusites  are  attached 
to  the  Amorites,  the  Perizzites  to  the  Hittites,  and  the 
Girgashites  to  the  Hivites. 

If,  from  the  bare  enumeration  of  names  and  geo¬ 
graphical  situations,  we  pass  to  the  outward  appear¬ 
ance,  or  the  moral  and  social  condition  of  the  inhabi¬ 
tants  of  Syria,  when  the  Israelites  broke  in  upon  them, 
the  task  is  far  more  difficult.  They  seem  to  rise  be¬ 
fore  us  only  to  vanish  away.  Hardly  a  dying  word 
escapes.  The  Sacred  historian  turns  away  as  if  in 
silent  aversion.  Yet  the  picture,  which  from  the 
Israelite  point  of  view  is  so  dark  and  shadowy,  receives 
The  Phce-  a  sudden  light  from  a  quarter  then  unknown 
Canaanites.  and  unthought  of.  It  is  startling  to  be  remind¬ 
ed  that  “  Canaanite  ”  is  but  another  name 1  for  “  Phoe¬ 
nician  ;  ”  that  the  detested  and  accursed  race,  as  it 
appears  in  the  Books  of  Joshua  and  Judges,  is  the 
same  as  that  to  which  from  Greece  we  look  back  as 
the  parent  of  letters,  of  commerce,  of  civilization.  The 
Septuagint  translators  wavered  between  preserving  the 
original  Hebrew  word,  or  adopting  the  name  of 
“  Phoenician,”  as  already  recognized  by  the  Greek  lan¬ 
guage.  Had  they  chosen  in  all  cases,  as  they  have 
in  some,2  the  latter  of  these  two  alternatives,  it  is 
curious  to  reflect  how  essentially  our  ideas  of  the  an¬ 
cient  inhabitants  of  Palestine  might  have  been  modi¬ 
fied.  Yet,  in  fact,  the  illustrations  of  the  Phoenician 

For  the  name  of  “  Canaanite  ”  as  2  The  word  is  so  translated  by  the 
coextensive  with  “  Phoenician,"  see  LXX.  in  Ex.  xvi.  35 ;  Josh.  v.  1. 
Kenrick’s  Phoenicia,  42,  52. 


Lect.  IX. 


CANAANITE  RACES. 


233 


or  Canaanite  history  from  Gentile  sources  coincide 
substantially  with  what  we  learn  from  the  Jewish  an¬ 
nals.  In  both,  we  see  the  same  dusky  complexion 
of  the  race,1  distinguished  alike  from  the  western 
Greeks  and  the  eastern  Israelites.  In  both,  we  track 
them  advancing  into  Palestine  from  the  extreme  south.2 
In  both,  the  coexistence,  side  by  side,  of  monarchical, 
federal,3  and  aristocratic  institutions  can  be  traced.  In 
both,  their  general  equality,  if  not  superiority,  in  social 
arts  to  the  surrounding  nations  and  to  the  Israelites 
themselves,  is  acknowledged.  They  are  in  possession 
of  fortified  towns,  treasures  of  brass,  iron,  gold,  and 
foreign  merchandise.  They,  no  less  than  the  Egyp¬ 
tians  and  Israelites,  retain  the  mark  of  an  ancient 
sacred  civilization  in  the  rite  of  circumcision.4  And 
in  both  accounts,  their  religious  rites  are  described  in 
the  same  terms,  —  human  sacrifices,  licentious  orgies, 
the  worship  of  a  host  of  divinities.  But  the  differ¬ 
ence  between  the  two  representations,  which  has,  in 
fact,  almost  blinded  us  to  the  fact  of  the  identity  of 
the  nation  described  by  the  two  authorities,  is  more 
instructive  than  their  likeness.  The  Israelite  version, 
on  the  one  hand,  we  must  freely  grant,  takes  no  heed 
of  the  nobler  aspect  which  this  great  people  present¬ 
ed  to  the  western  world ;  or,  at  least,  not  till  the 
wider  prophetic  view  of  Isaiah  and  Ezekiel  compre¬ 
hended  within  the  sympathy  of  the  Jewish  Church 


1  For  the  dark  color  of  the  race  see 
the  arguments  adduced  both  from 
Gen.  x.  7,  and  from  Strabo,  xii.  144, 
in  Kenrick’s  Phoenicia ,  50,  52. 

2  Kenrick,  50. 

3  See  Ewald,  ii.  337,  and  Lecture 
XV. 

4  The  argument  from  the  excep- 

30 


tional  case  of  the  Philistines,  1  Sam. 
xviii.  25-27 ;  2  Sam.  i.  20,  combined 
with  the  historical  statement  in  Herod, 
ii.  104,  is  convincing.  From  Gen. 
xxxiv.  15,  it  would  appear  that  the 
early  Shechemites  were  not  circum¬ 
cised. 


234 


CONQUEST  OF  EASTERN  PALESTINE. 


Lect.  IX. 


the  grander  elements  of  Sidonian  power  and  Tyrian 
splendor.  But,  on  the  other  hand,  the  Gentile  ac¬ 
counts  are  insensible  to  the  cruel,  debasing,  and  name¬ 
less  sins  which  turned  the  heart  of  the  Israelite  sick, 
in  the  worship  of  Baal,  Astarte,  and  Moloch.  It  is 
true  that  these  are  but  the  same  divinities,  whom 
we  regard  leniently,  if  not  indulgently,  when  we  find 
them  in  the  forms  of  Jupiter,  Apollo,  Yenus,  Hercules, 
Adonis.  But  the  other  phase  is  not  to  be  forgotten; 
and  when  Milton  took  these  names  of  Syrian  idols 
to  represent  the  evil  spirits  of  Pandemonium,  and 
thus  renewed,  as  it  were,  to  them  a  lease  of  exist¬ 
ence  which  seemed  long  since  to  have  died  out,  he 
did  but  place  us,  though  but  for  a  moment,  in  the 
condition  of  the  soldiers  of  the  first  conquest  of  Pales¬ 
tine,  to  whom  Beelzebub  and  Moloch  were  living 
powers  of  evil,  as  hateful  as  though  they  actually 
personified  the  principles  with  which  he  has  identified 
them.1  The  bright  side  of  Polytheism  is  so  familiar 
to  us  in  the  mythology  of  Greece,  that  it  is  well 
to  be  recalled  for  a  time  to  its  dark  side  in  Pales¬ 
tine. 

From  the  general  consideration  of  the  Conquest,  we 
Conquest  of  turn  to  the  first  stage  of  it  in  the  territory 
Palestine,  east  of  the  Jordan,  —  that  mysterious  eastern 
frontier  of  the  Holy  Land,  so  beautiful,  so  romantic, 
so  little  known,  whether  we  look  at  it  through  the 
distant  glimpses  and  hasty  surveys  of  it  obtained  by 
modern  travellers,  or  the  scanty  notices  of  its  first 
conquest  in  the  Book  of  Numbers. 

On  the  eastern  side  of  the  Jordan  valley  two  frag- 

1  “  Before  Milton,  if  Moloch,  Belial,  and  distinct  poetic  existence.”  Mil- 
Mammon,  &c\,  were  not  absolutely  un-  man’s  Latin  Christianity ,  book  xiv, 
known  to  history,  they  had  no  proper  ch.  2. 


Lect.  IX. 


CONQUEST  OF  HESHBON. 


235 


ments  of  the  aboriginal  race  had  existed  under  the 
name  of  “  Emim,”  and  “  Zamzummim  ”  or  “  Zuzim 1 
These  old  inhabitants  had  been  expelled  by  the  kin¬ 
dred  tribes  of  Moab  and  Ammon.  But  they  in  turn 
had,  just  before  the  point  of  the  history  at  which  we 
have  now  arrived,  been  dispossessed  by  two  Canaanite 
chiefs  of  a  considerable  portion  of  the  territory  which 
they  had  themselves  acquired. 

On  this  motley  ground  the  Israelites  appeared  in 
the  double  light  of  conquerors  and  deliverers.  The 
story  is  briefly  told ;  but  its  main  features  are  dis¬ 
cernible,  and  it  illustrates  in  many  points  the  greater 
conquest  for  which  it  prepared  the  way. 

The  attack  on  the  two  Canaanite  kings  was  assists 
ed  by  a  strange  visitation  which  had  just  befallen  the 
Transjordanic  territory.  Immense  swarms  of  hornets, 
always  common  in  Palestine,2  burst  upon  the  country 
with  unusual  force.3  The  chiefs  were  thus  probably 
driven  out  of  their  fastnesses,  and  forced  into  the 
plain,  where  the  final  conflict  took  place. 

The  first  onslaught  was  upon  Sihon.  He  occupied 
the  whole  district  between  the  Arnon  and  sihon. 


Jabbok,  through  which  the  approach  to  the  Heshbon. 
Jordan  lay.  He  had  wrested  it  from  the  predecessor 
of  Balak,  and  had  established  himself,  not  in  the  an¬ 
cient  capital  of  Moab  —  Ar,  but  in  the  city,  still  con¬ 
spicuous  to  the  modern  traveller  from  its  wide  pros¬ 
pect  and  its  cluster  of  stone-pines  —  Heshbon.  The 
recollection  of  his  victory  survived  in  a  savage  war- 


1  Gen.  xiv.  5  ;  Deut.  ii.  10,  20. 

2  Deut.  i.  44  ;  Ps.  cxviii.  12,  and  the 
name  of  Zoreah  (=  hornet)  Josh.  xv. 
33.  These  passages  make  a  literal 

acceptation  of  the  texts  above  cited 


the  most  natural.  See  Mr.  Cyril 
Graham’s  “  Ancient  Bashan  ”  in  Cam¬ 
bridge  Essays ,  147. 

3  Ex.  xxiii.  28 ;  Deut.  vii.  21 ; 
Josh.  xxiv.  12 ;  Wisd.  xii.  18. 


236 


CONQUEST  OF  EASTEEN  PALESTINE. 


Lect.  IX. 


song,1  which  passed  into  a  kind  of  proverb  in  after¬ 
times  : — 

“  Come  home  to  Heshbon ; 

Let  the  city  of  Sihon  be  built  and  prepared, 

For  there  is  gone  out  a  fire  from  Heshbon, 

A  flame  from  the  city  of  Sihon. 

It  hath  consumed  Ar  of  Moab, 

And  the  lords  of  the  high  places  of  Arnon : 

Woe  to  thee,  Moab:  thou  art  undone,  thou  people  of  Chemosh! 

He  hath  given  his  sons  that  escaped,  and  his  daughters,  into  captivity 
To  the  King  of  the  Amorites,  Sihon.” 

The  decisive  battle  between  Sihon  and  his  new  foes 
Battle  of  took  place  at  Jahaz,  probably  on  the  confines 
jahaz.  0p  pastures  of  Moab  and  the  desert 

whence  the  Israelites  emerged.  It  was  the  first  en¬ 
gagement  in  which  they  were  confronted  with  the 
future  enemies  of  their  nation.  The  slingers  and 
archers  of  Israel,  afterwards  so  renowned,  now  first 
showed  their  skill.  Sihon  fell;  the  army  fled2  (so  ran 
the  later  tradition),  and,  devoured  by  thirst,  like  the 
Athenians  in  the  Assinarus,  on  their  flight  from  Syra¬ 
cuse,  was  slaughtered  in  the  bed  of  one  of  the  moun¬ 
tain  streams.  The  memory  of  this  battle  was  cherished 
in  triumphant  strains,  in  which,  after  reciting,  in  bitter 
irony,  the  song,  just  quoted,  of  the  Amorites’  triumph, 
they  broke  out  into  an  exulting  contrast  of  the  past 
greatness  of  the  defeated  chief  and  his  present  fall :  — 

“We  have  shot  at  them :  Heshbon  is  perished : 

We  have  laid  them  waste:  even  unto  Nophah: 

With  fire  : 3  even  unto  Medeba.” 

Subject  to  Sihon,  as  vassals,4  were  five  Arabian 

1  Num.  xxi.  27-29  repeated,  as  if  where  the  same  word  is  used  of  the 
well  known,  in  Jer.  xlviii.  45,  46.  Midianite  chiefs  Oreb  and  Zeeb. 

2  Jos.  Ant.  iv.  5,  §  2.  They  are  called  “  kings,”  Num.  xxxi. 

3  Num.  xxi.  30  (LXX.).  8;  “ princes,”  Josh. xiii.  21 ;  “elders,” 

4  The  word  translated  “  dukes,”  Num.  xxii.  4. 

Josh.  xiii.  21.  Comp.  Ps.  lxxxiii.  11, 


Lect.  IX. 


DEFEAT  OF  MIDIAN. 


237 


chiefs,  of  the  great  tribe  of  Midian.  Their  names 
are  preserved  to  us,1  —  Evi,  Rekem,  Zur,  Hur,  Defeat  of 
and  Reba.  It  was  they  who,  doubtless  ter- Midian* 
rifled  at  the  fall  of  their  sovereign,  persuaded  the 
King  of  Moab  to  rid  himself  of  the  dangerous,  though 
at  first  welcome  intruders,  by  the  curse  of  Balaam. 
When  this  failed,  and  when  the  more  sure  and  fatal 
ruin  of  the  contagion  of  the  licentious  rites  of  Midian 
provoked  the  religious  and  moral  feeling  of  the  better 
spirits  of  the  nation  to  that  terrible  retribution  of 
which  the  later  conquest  was  one  long  exemplification, 
a  sacred  war  was  proclaimed.  It  was  headed,  not  by 
the  soldier  Joshua,  but  by  the  Priest  Phinehas.  The 
Ark  went  with  the  host.  The  sacred  trumpets  were 
blown.  The  chiefs  of  Midian  were  slain : 2  the  great 
prophet  of  the  East  fell  with  them.3  Their  stone 
enclosures4  were  taken.5  Their  pastoral  wealth  fell  to 
their  conquerors,  as  in  the  case  of  the  second  great 
defeat  of  their  tribe  achieved  by  Gideon,6  —  ornaments 
of  gold,  and  thousands  of  oxen,  sheep,  and  asses. 
And  then  took  place  the  first  wholesale  extermination 
of  a  conquered  tribe.7 

The  way  was  now  clear  to  the  Jordan.  But  the 
career  of  conquest  opened  on  its  eastern  bank  0g,  King 
was  not  easily  closed.  It  is  possible  that  the  ot  kashan* 
thought  of  pushing  forward  in  this  direction  was  sug¬ 
gested  to  them  by  the  neighboring  and  kindred  tribe 


1  Num.  xxxi.  8. 

2  Ibid.  6,  7,  8. 

3  In  the  Samaritan  Joshua  (ch.  8), 
he  is  dragged  out  of  the  temple  by- 

Joshua,  who  wishes  to  spare  him ; 

but  the  fierce  Simeonites  insist  on 

his  being  put  to  death,  lest  he  should 

fascinate  them  by  his  spells. 


4  Translated  “castles”  in  Gen. 
xxv.  16. 

5  Num.  xxxi.  10. 

6  Judg.  viii.  26;  Num,  xxxi.  36, 
37-39. 

7  See  Lecture  XI. 


238 


CONQUEST  OF  EASTERN  PALESTINE. 


Lect.  IX. 


of  Ammon,  "too  strong”  to  be  subdued,  and  even 
more  interested  than  themselves  in  the  expulsion  of 
the  second  Canaanite  chief,  who  had  occupied  the 
territory  north  of  Ammon,  apparently  at  the  same 
time  that  Sihon  had  occupied  the  territory  east  of 
Moab. 

This  was  0 g,  king  of  the  district  which,  under  the 
name  of  Bashan,  extended  from  the  J abbok  up  to  the 
base  of  Hermon.  There  is  no  direct  notice,  as  in  the 
case  of  Sihon,  of  his  having  invaded  the  country,  and 
this  omission,  combined  with  the  mention  of  his  gigan¬ 
tic  stature,  warrants  the  conjecture  that  he  was  one 
of  the  leaders  of  the  aboriginal  race,  for  which  Bashan 
had  always  been  renowned. 

In  this  joint  expedition  of  Israel  and  Ammon,  the 
commanders  were  two  heroes  of  the  tribe  of  Manas- 
seh,  Jair  and  Nobah.1 

The  fastness  of  Og  was  the  remarkable  circular  dis- 
Battie  of  trict  formerly  known  by  the  name  of  Argob, 
or  the  "  stony,”  rendered  by  the  Greeks 
"  Trachonitis ;  ”  or  Chebel,  "  rope,”  as  if  from  the 
marked  character  of  its  boundary,2  rendered  by  the 
corresponding  Arabic  word  "  Leja  ”  It  is  described  as 
suddenly  rising  from  the  fertile  plain,  an  island  of 
basalt:  its  rocky  desolation,  its  vast  fissures,  more  re¬ 
sembling  the  features  of  some  portions  of  the  moon, 
than  any  formation  on  the  earth.  At  the  entrance 
of  this  fastness,  as  if  in  the  Thermopylae  of  the  king¬ 
dom,  is  Edrei.  Here  Og  met  the  invaders.3  The  bat¬ 
tle  was  lost,  and  Bashan  fell.  Ashtaroth-Karnaim,  the 

1  In  Numb,  xxxii.  39-42,  Josh.  2  See  Article  “  Argob,”  Dictionary 
xvii.  1,  “Macliir”  is  mentioned,  but  of  the  Bible ,  p.  42. 
it  would  seem  that  this  (like  Judah  3  Num.  xxi.  33.  Mr.  Cyril  Gra- 
and  Simeon  in  Judg.  i.  17)  is  a  per-  ham  in  Cambridge  Essays,  i.  145. — 
unification  of  the  tribe.  Porter’s  Damascus,  ii.  220. 


Lect.  IX. 


CONQUEST  OF  BASHAN. 


239 


sanctuary  of  the  Horned  Astarte,1  and  perhaps  the 
same  as  the  capital  Kenath,  surrendered.  It  had 
been  already  the  scene  of  a  signal  defeat  in  still 
more  primitive  times,  when  the  aboriginal  inhabi¬ 
tants  were  attacked  by  the  Assyrian  invaders  from 
the  East.2 

The  Ammonites3  carried  off  as  their  trophy  the 
"iron  bedstead”  (perhaps  the  basaltic  coffin,  Sett]ement 
like  that  of  Esmunazar  recently  found  at  Sidon) of  Bashan- 
of  the  gigantic  0 g.  The  Israelites  occupied  the  whole 
country,  remarkable  even  then  for  its  sixty  cities,4 
strongly  walled  and  fortified.  Here,  as  throughout 
the  Transjordanic  territory,  the  native  names  were 
altered,  and  new  titles  imposed  by  the  Israelites,  as 
if  at  once  determined  on  making  a  permanent  settle¬ 
ment.  The  basaltic  character  of  the  country  lent 
itself  to  these  cities,  as  naturally  as  the  limestone  of 
Palestine  and  sandstone  of  Edom  opened  into  habita¬ 
tions  in  holes  and  caves.  The  country  which  thus 
fell  into  their  hands  was  that  known  by  the  name  of 
Gilead,  —  a  name  which  it  never  lost,  and  which  out¬ 
lived  and  superseded  the  divisions  of  the  three  con¬ 
quering  tribes.  The  two  Israelite  chiefs  took,  as  it 
would  seem,  different  portions.  Jair5  occupied  the 
more  pastoral  part,  and  founded  thirty  nomadic  vil¬ 
lages,  called  after  his  name,  “  the  villages  of  Jair.” 6 

1  Figures  and  coins  with  a  crescent  But  their  existence  unquestionably 

have  been  found  at  Kenath.  —  Porter’s  illustrates  those  mentioned  in  Deut. 
Damascus ,  ii.  106-114.  iii.  4,  5. 

2  Gen.  xiv.  5.  5  Jair  was  in  some  way  allied  with 

3  Deut.  iii.  3-11.  the  family  of  Caleb,  1  Cliron.  ii.  23 ; 

4  Porter’s  Damascus ,  ii.  196,  206.  but  the  statement  is  too  confused  to 
Graham  in  Cambridge  Essays ,  160.  furnish  any  basis  of  additional  infor- 
Lengerke’s  Kenaan ,  392.  I  do  not  mation. 

pretend  to  pronounce  an  opinion  on  6  Num.  xxxii.  41 ;  Jos.  xiii.  30 ; 
’.he  age  of  the  cities  as  thus  described.  Ewald,  ii.  298. 


240 


SETTLEMENT  OF  EASTERN  PALESTINE.  Lect.  IX. 


Nobah  took  possession  of  Kenath,  the  capital,  of  which 
he  must  have  been  the  captor,  and  to  this  he  also 
gave  his  name,  though  the  old  one,  as  so  often  in 
Syria,  returned. 

Of  these  two  chiefs  we  know  but  little  more.  It 
Jair.  is  possible  that  Jair  is  the  same  as  the  stately 
head1  of  a  vast  family  mentioned  amongst  the  Judges. 
His  name  lingered  down  to  the  time  of  the  Chris¬ 
tian  era ;  when,  in  the  same  region  as  that  which 
he  conquered,  we  find  “  a  ruler  of  the  synagogue 
named  Jair,”  “  whose  daughter2  was  at  the  point  of 
death.” 

Nobah  occurs  nowhere  else  in  the  Hebrew  Scrip- 
Nobah.  tures.  But  a  certain  grandeur  must  have 
attached  to  his  career  to  cause  his  selection  as  the 
representative  of  the  Transjordanic  tribes  in  the  Sa¬ 
maritan  Book  of  Joshua.3  There,  under  the  name  of 
Nabih ,  he  receives  from  Joshua  the  solemn  investiture 
of  royalty  over  the  Eastern  tribes,  and  sits  in  state, 
clothed  in  green,  on  his  throne  of  judgment.  The 
portion  of  the  Manassite  tribe  which  he  represented, 
and  which  lay  beyond  the  limits  of  Gilead,  must  have 
furnished  the  more  civilized  and  settled  part  of  the 
Transjordanic  population,  which  dwelt  in  the  walled 
cities  left  by  the  expelled  Canaanites. 

Whether  the  settlement  of  the  Eastern  territory  of 
Causes  of  Palestine  was  accomplished,  as  the  Book  of 

settle-  ^ 

meat.  Numbers  would  lead  us  to  infer,  within  a  few 
months,  or,  as  the  Books  of  Joshua  and  Judges  would 
imply,  in  a  period  extending  over  many  years,  must 
be  left  uncertain.  But  the  causes  which  led  to  it 
are  natural  in'  themselves,  and  are  expressly  pointed 
out  in  the  Biblical  narrative.  The  Transjordanic  terri- 


1  Judg.  x.  3-5. 


3  Chap.  12,  24. 


2  Luke  viii.  41. 


Lect.  IX. 


CAUSES  OF  THE  SETTLEMENT. 


241 


tory  was  the  forest-land,  the  pasture-land  of  Palestine. 
The  smooth  downs  received  a  special  name,1  Natural 

t  '  features  of 

“  Mishor ,”  expressive  of  their  contrast  with  the  Trans- 

'  x  '  jordamc 

the  rough  and  rocky  soil  of  the  west.  The  district. 

“  oaks  ”  of  Bashan,  which  still  fill  the  traveller  with 
admiration,  were  to  the  prophets  and  psalmists  of 
Israel  the  chief  glory  of  the  vegetation  of  their  com¬ 
mon  country.  The  vast  herds  of  wild  cattle  which 
then  wandered  through  the  woods,  as  those  of  Scot¬ 
land  through  its  ancient  forests,  were,  in  like  manner, 
at  once  the  terror  and  pride  of  the  Israelite,  —  “the 
fat  bulls  of  Bashan.”  The  King  of  Moab  was  but  a 
great  “sheep-master,”  and  “rendered”  for  tribute  “an 
“  hundred  thousand  lambs,  and  an  hundred  thousand 
“  rams  with  the  wool.”  And  still  the  countless  herds 
and  flocks  may  be  seen,  droves  of  cattle  moving  on 
like  troops  of  soldiers,  descending  at  sunset  to  drink 
of  the  springs,  —  literally,  in  the  language  of  the 
Prophet,  “rams  and  lambs,  and  goats,  and  bullocks, 
“  all  of  them  fatlings  of  Bashan.” 

In  the  encampment  of  Israel,  two  tribes,  Beuhen 
and  Gad,  were  preeminently  nomadic.  They  had  “a 
“very  great  multitude  of  cattle.”  For  this  they  de¬ 
sired  the  land,  and  for  this  it  was  given  to  them, 
“  that  they  might  build  cities  for  their  little  ones, 
“  and  folds  for  their  sheep .” 2  In  no  other  case  is  the 
relation  between  the  territory  and  its  occupiers  so  ex¬ 
pressly  laid  down,  and  such  it  continued  to  be  to  the 
end.  From  first  to  last  they  alone  of  the  tribes 
never  emerged  from  the  state  of  their  Patriarchal  an¬ 
cestors.  Gad  and  Reuben  accordingly  divided  the 
kingdom  of  Sihon  between  them,  that  is,  the  terri¬ 
tory  between  the  Arnon  and  the  Jabbok,  and  the 

1  Sinai  and  Palestine ,  App.  §  6.  2  Num.  xxxii.  16,  24. 

31 


242 


SETTLEMENT  OF  EASTERN  PALESTINE.  Lect.  IX 


eastern  side  of  the  Jordan  valley  up  to  the  Lake  of 
Chinnereth,1  or  Gennesareth. 

Reuben  was  the  more  purely  pastoral  of  the  two, 
Reuben.  and  therefore  the  more  transitory.  -“Unstable 
“as  water/’  he  vanishes  away  into  a  mere  Arabian 
“tribe  ;  his  men  are  few;”2  it  is  all  that  he  can  do  “to 
“  live  and  not  die.”  The  only  events  of  their  subse¬ 
quent  history  are  the  multiplication  of  “their  cattle 
“in  the  land  of  Gilead;”  their  “wars”  with  the  Bedouin 
“sons  of  Hagar;”3  their  spoils  of  “camels  fifty  thou¬ 
sand,  and  of  sheep  two  hundred  and  fifty  thousand, 
“and  of  asses  two  thousand.”  In  the  chief  struggles 
of  the  nation  Reuben  never  took  part.  The  complaint 
against  him  in  the  Song  of  Deborah  is  the  summary 
of  his  whole  history,  “By  the  ‘streams’  of  Reuben,”4 
that  is,  by  the  fresh  streams  which  descend  from  the 
eastern  hills  into  the  Jordan  and  the  Dead  Sea,  on 
whose  banks  the  Bedouin  chiefs  then,  as  now,  met  to 
debate.  “  By  the  ‘  streams  ’  of  Reuben  great  were 
“the  ‘debates.’  Why  dwellest  thou  among  the  sheep 
“  ‘  troughs  ’  to  hear  the  ‘  pipings  ’  of  the  flocks  ?  By 
‘Hhe  ‘streams’  of  Reuben  great  were  the  searchings 
“of  heart.” 

Gad  has  a  more  distinctive  character.  In  the  forest 
Gad.  region  south  of  the  Jabbok,  “he  dwelt  as  a 
“lion.”5  Out  of  his  tribe  came  the  eleven  valiant  chiefs 
who  crossed  the  fords  of  the  Jordan  in  flood-time  to 
join  the  outlawed  David,  “  whose  faces  were  like  the 
“faces  of  lions,6  and  were  as  swift  as  the  ‘gazelles/ 
‘<upon  the  mountains.”  These  heroes  also  were  the 

1  Josh.  xiii.  15-28;  Num.  xxxii.  2  Deut.  xxxiii.  6.  The  English 
34-38.  See  Mr.  Grove’s  article  on  version,  without  any  authority,  adds 
Gad  in  Diet,  of  the  Bible.  the  word  “  not.” 

3  1  Chr.  v.  10.  4  Judg.  v.  15,  16. 

5  Deut.  xxxiii.  20.  6  i  Chr.  xii.  8-13. 


Lect.  IX. 


TRANSJORDANIC  TRIBES. 


248 


Bedouins  of  their  own  time.  The  very  name  of  Gad 
expressed  the  wild  aspect  which  he  presented  to  the 
wild  tribes  of  the  East.  “  Gad  is  ‘  a  troop  of  plun- 
“  derers ;  ’ 1  a  troop  of  plunderers  shall  tf  plunder  ’  him, 
“but  he  shall  ‘ plunder’  at  the  last.” 

The  northern  outposts  of  the  eastern  tribes  were 
intrusted  to  that  portion  of  Manasseh  which  Manasseh. 
had  originally  attacked  and  expelled  the  Amorite  in¬ 
habitants  from  Gilead.  The  same  martial  spirit  which 
fitted  the  western  Manasseh  to  defend  the  passes  of 
Esdraelon,  fitted  “Machir,  the  first-born  of  Manasseh, 
“  the  father  of  Gilead,”  to  defend  the  passes  of  Hauran 
and  Anti-Libanus ;  “because  he  was  a  man  of  war, 
“therefore  he  had  Gilead  and  Bashan.”  The  pastoral 
character  common  to  Gad  and  Reuben  was  shared, 
but  in  a  much  less  degree,  by  these  descendants  of 
the  ruling  tribe  of  Joseph. 

It  is  evident  that  with  a  country  so  congenial,  and 
a  geographical  separation  so  complete,  a  disruption 
might  be  at  once  anticipated  between  these  pastoral 
tribes  and  their  western  brethren,  similar  to  that 
which  some  centuries  later,  from  other  causes,  dis¬ 
membered  the  monarchy  of  David. 

One  of  the  most  famous  texts  in  the  Bible  is 
founded  on  the  apprehension  of  this  probable  calamity, 
when  Moses  warned  the  Transjordanic  tribes  that  they 
were  bound  to  follow  their  brethren  to  assist  in  the 
conquest  of  Western  Palestine.  “If  ye  will  not  do  so, 
“  behold,  ye  have  sinned  against  the  Lord :  and  be  sure 
“ your  sin  will  find  you  out”2  How  it  would  have  found 
them  out,  we  can  see  from  the  fate  of  Reuben.  The 

1  Gen.  xlix.  19.  which  have  been  published  on  this 

2  Num.xxxii.  23.  IntheLXX.“Ye  text,  I  cannot  forbear  to  refer  to 
shall  know  your  sin  when  it  finds  you  one  of  remarkable  excellence  by  the 
out.”  Amongst  the  many  sermons  late  Rev.  J.  H.  Gurney. 


I 


244 


SETTLEMENT  OE  EASTERN  PALESTINE.]  Lect.  IX. 


nearest  actual  approach  to  a  breach  was  on  the  re- 
Contro-  turn  the  Eastern  tribes  after  the  western 
tween  the  conquest,  when  their  simple  pastoral  monu- 
welfem and  ment  of  stones  was  mistaken  by  the  other 
tnbes.  tribes  for  an  altar.  It  was  put  up,  apparently, 
by  Bohan,  the  Reubenite,  and  called  after  his  name, 
between  the  fords  and  the  mouth  of  the  Jordan.1 
They  were  pursued  by  Phinehas,2  ready  for  another 
sacred  war,  like  that  in  which  he  had  destroyed  the 
Midianites.  The  whole  transaction  is  an  instance  of 
what  has  often  occurred  afterwards  in  ecclesiastical 
history.  What  was  meant  innocently,  though,  perhaps, 
without  due  regard  for  the  consequences,  is  taken  for 
a  conspiracy,  a  rebellion,  an  attempt  to  overthrow  the 
faith.  There  are  always  theologians  keen-sighted  to 
see  heresy  in  the  simplest  orthodoxy,  and  superstition 
in  the  most  harmless  ceremony.  There  have  been 
places,  where  it  has  been  impossible,  without  incur¬ 
ring  dangerous  suspicions  of  idolatry,  to  mention  the 
Cross  of  Christ.  There  have  been  those,  from  the 
first  ages  of  the  Church  downwards,  before  whom  it 
has  been  impossible,  without  incurring  dangerous  sus¬ 
picions  of  Atheism,  even  to  profess  the  Christian  re¬ 
ligion.  The  solution  of  the  controversy  between  the 
two  pastoral  eastern  tribes  and  their  western  brethren 
in  the  Jewish  Church,  is  one  which  might  have  saved 
the  schism  of  the  Eastern  Church  from  the  Western, 
and  have  prevented  many  bitter  controversies  and 
persecutions  in  all  Churches. 

On  the  one  hand,  the  Reubenites  and  their  com¬ 
panions  said:  “The  Lord  God  of  Gods,  the  Lord  God 
“  of  Gods,  He  knoweth,  and  Israel  he  shall  know.  If 
“it  be  in  rebellion,  or  if  in  transgression  against  the 


1  Josh.  xv.  6,  xxii.  11. 


2  lb.  xxii.  13. 


Lect.  IX. 


CONTROVERSY  OF  EAST  AND  WEST 


245 


“  Lord,  save  us  not  this  day.” 1  It  is  a  text  invested 
with  a  mournful  interest  —  for  it  is  that  on  which 
Welsh,  the  minister  of  the  army  of  the  Covenanters, 
preached  before  the  Battle  of  Bothwell  Bridge. 
Whether  or  not  it  was  sincerely  used  in  that  latter 
application,  on  this,  its  first  occasion,  it  truly  ex¬ 
pressed  the  absence  of  any  sinister  intention,  and  it 
was  accepted  as  such  even  by  the  fierce,  un-  Its  inten_ 
compromising  Phinehas.  “  This  day  we  per- tl0n- 
“  ceive  that  the  Lord  is  among  us,  because  ye  have 
“  not  committed  this  trespass  against  the  Lord  :  now 
“ye  have  delivered  the  children  of  Israel  out  of  the 
“  hand  of  the  Lord  ”  He  did  not  push  matters  to 
extremities  —  he  was  thankful  to  have  been  spared  the 
great  crime  of  attacking  as  a  moral  sin  what  was  only 
an  error  (if  so  be)  of  judgment.  Alas !  how  seldom  in 
the  history  of  religious  divisions  have  thanks  been  re¬ 
turned  for  a  deliverance  from  a  crime  which  many  re¬ 
ligious  leaders  have  regarded  as  a  duty  and  a  blessing. 

The  Eastern  tribes  returned  to  their  distant  homes. 
Their  reward  was  that,  in  after-ages,  slight  as  the 
connection  might  be  with  the  rest  of  the  nation,  it 
was  never  entirely  broken. 

One  reminiscence  of  this  connection  is  preserved  in 
a  splendid  legend  of  the  Samaritans.  It  re-  Legend  of 
cords  how,  when  at  the  close  of  his  campaigns,  Nobah* 
Joshua  was  beset  not  merely  with  the  armies,  but  with 
the  enchantments,  of  the  Canaanites  and  Persians,  and 
imprisoned  within  a  sevenfold  wall  of  iron,  a  carrier 
pigeon  conveyed  the  tidings  of  his  situation  to  Nobah, 
who  sprang  from  his  judgment-seat,  and,  with  a  shout 
that  rang  to  the  ends  of  the  universe,  summoned  his 
Transjordanic  troops  around  him.  They  came  in  thou- 

1  Josh.  xxii.  22. 


246 


SETTLEMENT  OF  EASTERN  PALESTINE.  Lect.  IX 


sands.  One  band,  clothed  in  white,  rode  on  red  horses. 
Another,  clothed  in  red,  rode  on  white  horses ;  a  third, 
in  green,  on  black  horses,  a  fourth,  in  black,  on  spot¬ 
ted  horses.  Nobah  himself  rode  at  their  head  on  a 
steed,  beautiful  as  a  panther,  fleet  as  the  wflnds.  He 
approaches,  under  cover  of  a  hurricane,  which  drives 
the  birds  to  their  nests,  and  the  wild  beasts  to  their 
lairs,  and  enters  the  plain  of  Esdraelon.  The  mother 
of  the  Canaanite  king,  like  the  mother  of  Sisera,  or 
like  the  watchman  on  the  walls  of  Jezreel,1  goes  up 
to  the  tower  to  worship  the  sun.  She  sees  the  ad¬ 
vancing  splendors,  and  she  rushes  down  to  announce 
to  her  son  that  “  the  moon  and  the  stars  are  rising 
“  from  the  East :  woe  to  us,  if  they  be  enemies !  bless- 
“  ed  are  we,  if  they  are  friends !  ”  A  single  combat 
takes  place  between  Nobah  and  the  Canaanite  king, 
each  armed  with  his  mighty  bow.  At  last  the  king 
falls  —  by  the  spring  that  gushed  forth,  “  known  even 
“  to  this  day  as  the  Spring  of  the  Arrow.”  At  Joshua’s 
bidding,  the  priests  within  the  seven  iron  walls  blow 
their  trumpets  —  the  walls  fall  —  the  sun  stands  still, 
and  the  winds  fly  to  his  aid,  and  the  horses  of  the 
conquerors  plunge  up  to  their  nostrils  in  the  blood 
of  the  enemy.2 

This  wild  story  points  no  doubt  to  the  bond  of 
union  which  in  the  great  extremities  of  war  was  kept 
up  between  the  two  banks  of  the  Jordan.  The  battle- 
cry  of  the  Eastern  portion  of  Manasseh  seems  to  have 
extended  to  the  whole  tribe  —  “  Whosoever  is  fearful 
“  and  afraid,  let  him  depart  from  Mount  Gilead.” 3  But 
their  usual  relations  belong  to  a  more  touching  class 
of  recollections  and  anticipations. 

1  Judg.  v.  28  ;  2  Kings  ix.  17.  3  Judg.  vii.  3.  See  Lecture  XY. 

2  Samaritan  Joshua,  ch.  37. 


Lect.  IX. 


ITS  CONNECTION  WITH  THE  WEST. 


247 


Those  Eastern  hills  were  to  the  Western  Israelites 
the  land  of  exile,  —  the  refuge  of  exiles.  One  The  Eagt 
place  there  was  in  its  beautiful  uplands  con-  ofethfuse 
secrated  by  the  presence  of  God  in  primeval  West 
times.  “  Mahanaim  ”  marked  the  spot  where  Jacob 
had  divided  his  people  into  “two  hosts,”  and  seen  the 
66  Two  Hosts  ”  of  the  angelic  vision.1  To  this  scene  of 
the  great  crisis  in  their  ancestor’s  life  the  thoughts  of 
his  descendants  returned  in  after-years,  whenever  for¬ 
eign  conquest  or  civil  discord  drove  them  from  their 
native  hills  on  the  west  of  Jordan,  —  when  Abner  fled 
from  the  Philistines,  when  David  fled  from  Absalom, 
when  the  Israelite  captives  lingered  there  on  the  way 
to  Babylon,  when  David’s  greater  Son  found  there  a 
refuge  from  the  busy  world  which  filled  Jerusalem  and 
the  Sea  of  Galilee,  when  the  infant  Christian  Church 
of  Palestine  escaped  to  Pella  from  the  armies  of  Titus. 
From  these  heights,  one  and  all  of  these  exiles  must 
have  caught  the  last  glimpse  of  their  familiar  moun¬ 
tains.  There  is  one  plaintive  strain  which  sums  up 
all  these  feelings,  —  the  42d  Psalm.  Its  date  and  au¬ 
thorship  are  uncertain,  but  the  place  is  beyond  doubt 
the  Transjordanic  hills,  which  always  behold,  as  they 
are  always  beheld  from,  Western  Palestine.  As,  before 
the  eyes  of  the  exile,  the  “  gazelle  ”  of  the  forest  of 
Gilead  panted  after  the  fresh  streams  of  water  which 
thence  descend  to  the  Jordan,  so  his  soul  panted  after 
God,  from  whose  outward  presence  he  was  shut  out. 
The  river,  with  its  winding  rapids,  “  deep  calling  to 
deep,”  lay  between  him  and  his  home.  All  that  he 
could  now  do  was  to  remember  the  past,  as  he  stood 
“  in  the  land  of  Jordan,”  as  he  saw  the  peaks  of  “  Her- 
mon,”  as  he  found  himself  on  the  eastern  heights  of 

1  See  Lecture  III. 


248 


THE  EASTERN  HILLS. 


Lect.  IX. 


Mizar,  which  reminded  him  of  his  banishment  and  sol¬ 
itude.  The  Persean  hills  are  the  “  Pisgah  ”  of  the  ear¬ 
lier  history.  To  the  later  history  they  occupy  the 
pathetic  relation  that  has  been  immortalized  in  the 
name  of  the  long  ridge  from  which  the  first  and  the 
last  view  of  Granada  is  obtained ;  they  are  “  the  Last 
Sigh”  of  the  Israelite  exile.  In  our  own  time,  per¬ 
haps  in  all  times  of  their  history,  they  have  furnished 
to  the  familiar  scenes  of  Western  Palestine  a  shadowy 
background,  which  imparts  to  the  tamest  features  of 
the  landscape  a  mysterious  and  romantic  charm,  a 
sense  as  of  another  world,  to  the  dweller  on  this  side 
of  the  dividing  chasm  almost  inaccessible,  yet  always 
overhanging  the  distant  view  with  a  presence  not  to 
be  put  by.  And  with  this  thought  there  must  have 
been  blended,  in  large  periods  of  the  Jewish  history, 
a  feeling  which  has  now  long  since  died  away,  —  that 
from  these  Eastern  mountains,  and  from  the  desert 
beyond  them,  would  be  the  great  Return  of  the  scat¬ 
tered  members  of  the  race.  “  Mine  own  will  I  bring 
“  again  from  Bashan.”  “  How  beautiful  on  the  moun- 
“  tains  [of  the  East]  are  the  feet  of  him  that  bringeth 
“good  tidings”  —  “Make  straight  in  the  desert  [be- 
“  yond  the  Jordan]  a  highway  for  our  God.” 1 


1  Ps.  lxviii.  22  •,  Isa.  lii.  7 ;  xl.  3. 


Lect.  X. 


CONQUEST  OF  WESTERN  PALESTINE. 


249 


LECTURE  X. 

THE  CONQUEST  OF  WESTERN  PALESTINE  —  THE  FALL  OF 

JERICHO. 

The  Conquest  of  Eastern  Palestine  has  been  drawn 
out  at  length  in  the  preceding  Lecture,  because,  from 
the  scanty  and  fragmentary  notices  of  it  in  the  nar¬ 
rative,  we  are  in  danger  of  losing  sight  altogether  of 
a  remarkable  portion  both  of  the  Holy  Land  and  of 
the  Sacred  history.  But  it  is  a  true  feeling  which 
has  caused  the  chief  attention  to  be  fixed  on  the 
conquest  of  the  western  rather  than  of  the  eastern 
shores  of  the  Jordan,  as  the  turning-point,  in  this 
stage,  of  the  fortunes  of  the  Jewish  Church  and 
nation. 

We  have  seen  what  the  Eastern  territory  was, — 
how  congenial  to  the  nomadic  habits  of  a  Conquest 

°  i  i  ii*  °f  Western 

hitherto  pastoral  people :  a  land  in  some  re-  Palestine, 
spects  so  far  superior,  both  in  beauty  and  fertility, 
to  the  rugged  mountains  on  the  further  side.  “  The 
Lord  had  made  them  ride  on  the  high  places  of 
“  the  earth,  that  they  might  eat  the  increase  of  the 
“  fields ;  and  he  made  them  to  suck  honey  out  of  the 
66  6  cliff/  and  oil  out  of  the  flinty  rock;  butter  of  kine, 
and  milk  of  sheep ;  with  fat  of  lambs,  and  rams  of 
“  the  breed  of  Bashan,  and  goats ;  with  the  fat  of  kid- 
({ neys  of  wheat  and  .  . .  the  pure  blood  of  the  grape.”1 

1  Deut.  xxxii.  13,  14. 


32 


250 


CONQUEST  OF  WESTERN  PALESTINE. 


Lect.  X. 


So,  we  are  told,  spoke  their  Prophet-leader,  whilst 
they  were  still  in  enjoyment  of  this  rich  country. 
Yet  forwards  they  went.  It  was  the  same  high  call¬ 
ing  —  whether  we  give  it  the  name  of  destiny,  or 
Providence  —  which  had  already  drawn  Abraham  from 
Mesopotamia,  and  Moses  from  the  court  of  Memphis. 
They  knew  not  what  was  before  them;  they  knew 
not  what  depended  on  their  crossing  the  Jordan, — 
on  their  becoming  a  settled  and  agricultural,  instead 
of  a  nomadic  people,  —  on  their  reaching  to  the  shores 
of  the  Mediterranean  sea,  and  from  those  shores  re¬ 
ceiving  the  influences  of  the  Western  world,  and 
sending  forth  to  that  Western  world  their  influences 
in  return.  They  knew  not,  but  we  know;  and  the 
more  we  hear  of  the  beauty  of  the  Transjordanic  ter¬ 
ritory,  the  greater  is  the  wonder  —  the  greater,  we 
may  almost  say,  should  be  our  thankfulness  —  that 
they  exchanged  it  for  Palestine  itself ;  inferior  as  it 
might  naturally  have  seemed  to  them,  in  every  point, 
except  for  the  high  purposes  to  which  they  were 
called,  and  for  which  their  permanent  settlement  on 
the  eastern  side  of  the  Jordan  would,  humanly  speak¬ 
ing,  have  wholly  unfitted  them. 

It  was  to  inaugurate  this  new  era,  of  a  dangerous 
present  and  a  boundless  future,  that  a  new  character 
appears  on  the  scene.  In  the  Eastern  conquest,  we 
have  but  faintly  perceived  the  hands  by  which  the 
victory  was  won,  and  the  people  guided.  Moses,  in¬ 
deed,  is  still  living;  but  his  command  in  battle  is 
hardly  noticed.  Of  Jair  and  Nobah  we  know  scarce 
anything  but  the  names.  The  most  remarkable  leader 
Phinehas.  of  that  transitional  period,  whose  career  over¬ 
laps  also  that  on  which  we  are  now  entering,  is  the 
famous  son  of  the  High  Priest  Eleazar,  who  in  his 


Lect.  X. 


JOSHUA. 


251 


Egyptian 1  name  bore  the  last  trace  of  their  Egyptian 
sojourn.  Phinehas,  rather  than  his  father,  figures 
throughout  this  period  as  the  leading  member  of  the 
hierarchy.  In  the  conflict  with  Midian,2  in  the  dispute 
with  the  Keubenites,  in  the  war  with  the  Benjamites,3 
he  is  the  chief  oracle  and  adviser.  On  him  is  pro¬ 
nounced  the  blessing  which  secured  to  his  descendants 
the  inheritance  of  the  priesthood,  as  though  up  to 
that  time  the  succession  had  been  in  uncertainty. 
He  was  long  known  as  the  ruler  or  commander  of 
the  Levite  guard,4  and  as  the  type  of  indomitable 
zeal.  In  later  Jewish  traditions,  he  is  supposed  to 
have  received,  through  the  blessing  upon  his  zeal, 
the  gift  of  immortality,5  and  to  have  continued  on 
the  earth  till  he  reappeared  as  Elijah;  and  thus,  in 
Mussulman  fancy,  he  claims,  with  Elijah,  Jethro,  and 
S.  George,  to  be  identified  with  the  mysterious  Wan¬ 
derer,  who  goes  to  and  fro  on  the  earth,  to  set 
right  the  wrong  and  to  make  clear  the  dark.6 

But  the  fierce  Priest  was  not  to  be  the  successor 
of  the  first  of  the  Prophets.  It  was  from  an-  Joshua, 
other  tribe,  and  from  another  class  of  character,  that 
Moses  had  chosen  his  constant  companion,  his  minis¬ 
tering  servant.  Every  great  prophet  had  such  an 
attendant,  and  the  attendant  of  Moses  was  Joshua 
the  son  of  Nun.  He,  according  to  Jewish  tradition,7 
was  the  bosom  friend,  the  first  example  of  pure  and 
dear  friendship  in  the  Jewish  Church ;  and  to  him, 
rather  than  to  any  hereditary  kinsman,  was  the  guid¬ 
ance  of  the  nation  intrusted. 

1  Brugsch,  Egypt,  174.  5  See  Lecture  VUL 

2  See  Lecture  IX.  6  Fabricius,  Cod.  Pseudep.  i.  893 

3  See  Lecture  XIH.  894. 

4  Num.  xxv.  13  ;  Ps.cvi.  30  ;  1  Chr.  7  Philo,  De  Caritate,  ii.  384,  385. 
ix.  20. 


252 


JOSHUA. 


Lect.  X. 


Never,  in  the  history  of  the  Chosen  People,  could 
there  have  been  such  a  blank  as  that  when  they 
became  conscious  that  “  Moses  the  servant  of  the 
“  Lord  was  dead.”  He  who  had  been  their  leader, 
their  lawgiver,  their  oracle,  as  far  back  as  their 
memory  could  reach,  was  taken  from  them  at  the 
very  moment  wThen  they  seemed  most  to  need  him. 
It  was  to  fill  up  this  blank  that  Joshua  was  called. 
The  narrative  labors  to  impress  upon  us  the  sense 
that  the  continuity  of  the  nation  and  of  its  high 
purpose  was  not  broken  by  the  change  of  person 
and  situation.  “As  I  was  with  Moses,  so  will  I  be 
“  with  thee.  I  wrill  not  fail  thee,  nor  forsake  thee.” 1 
There  was,  indeed,  as  yet,  no  hereditary  or  fixed  suc¬ 
cession.  But  the  germ  of  that  succession  is  better 
represented  by  the  very  contrast  between  Moses  and 
Joshua,  than  in  any  other  passage  in  the  Sacred 
History. 

“  The  voice  that  from  the  glory  came, 

To  tell  how  Moses  died  unseen, 

And  waken  Joshua’s  spear  of  flame 
To  victory  on  the  mountains  green, 

Its  trumpet  tones  are  sounding  still, 

When  kings  or  parents  pass  away ; 

They  greet  us  with  a  cheering  thrill 
Of  power  or  comfort  in  decay.”  2 


The  difference,  indeed,  was  marked  as  strongly  as 
His  char-  possible.  Joshua  was  the  soldier,  —  the  first 
acter‘  soldier,  consecrated  by  the  Sacred  history. 
He  was  not  a  teacher,  not  a  Prophet.3  He,  one  may 

1  Josh.  i.  5.  whole  poem  well  carries  out  the 

2  This  poem  in  Keble’s  Christian  thought. 

Year  is  suggested  by  the  Service  for  3  In  the  Eastern  Church  Joshua 
the  Accession  of  the  English  Sover-  is  sometimes  reckoned  as  a  prophet, 
eigns,  on  which  day  this  portion  of  Josephus  (Ant.  v.  1,  §4)  seems  to  im- 
the  Book  of  Joshua  is  read.  The  ply  that  he  had  an  attendant  prophet,  ‘ 


Lect.  X. 


HIS  CHARACTER. 


253 


say,  hated  the  extension  of  Prophecy  with  a  feeling 
which  recalls  a  well-known  saying  of  the  great  war¬ 
rior  of  our  own  age.  He  could  not  restrain  his 
indignation  when  he  heard  that  there  were  two  un¬ 
authorized  prophesiers  within  the  camp.  "  My  Lord 
Moses,  forbid  them.”1  He  was  a  simple,  straightfor¬ 
ward,  undaunted  soldier.  His  first  appearance  is  in 
battle.  "  Choose  out  men,  go  out,  fight  with  Amalek.”2 
He  is  always  known  by  his  spear,-  or  javelin,  slung 
between  his  shoulders  or  stretched  out  in  his  hand.3 
The  one  quality  which  is  required  of  him,  and  de¬ 
scribed  in  him,  is  that  he  was  "very  courageous.” 
"He  was  strong  and  of  a  good  courage.”4  "He  was 
not  afraid  nor  dismayed.”  He  turned  neither  to  the 
right  hand  nor  to  the  left ;  but  at  the  head  of  the 
hosts  of  Israel  he  went  right  forward  from  Jordan  to 
Jericho,  from  Jericho  to  Ai,  from  Ai  to  Gibeon,  to 
Beth-horon,  to  Merom.  He  wavered  not  for  a  mo¬ 
ment  ;  he  was  here,  he  was  there,  he  was  everywhere, 
as  the  emergency  called  for  him.  He  had  no  words 
of  wisdom,  except  those  which  shrewd  common  sense 
and  public  spirit  dictated.5  To  him  the  Divine  Revela¬ 
tion  was  made  not  in  the  burning  bush  nor  in  the 
still  small  voice,  but  as  "the  Captain  of  the  Lord’s 
host,  with  a  drawn  sword  in  his  hand ;  ” 6  and  that 
drawn  and  glittering  sword  was  the  vision  which 

through  whom  the  divine  commands  1  Num.  xi.  28. 

were  given  to  him.  But  this  has  no  2  Ex.  xvii.  9. 

ground  in  the  narrative,  and  the  Mus-  3  Josh.  viii.  18,  26.  It  was  the  chi - 

sulman  traditions  expressly  exclude  don  or  light  javelin ;  see  the  article 

him  from  that  rank.  (Weil’s  Biblical  Arms,  in  Diet,  of  Bible. 

Legends ,  p.  144.)  It  is  probably  on  4  Josh.  i.  7,  9,  18. 
other  grounds  that  the  Book  of  Joshua  5  See  Lecture  XII. 
is  placed  amongst  the  “Prophets”  6  Josh.  v.  13. 
in  the  Jewish  canon.  See  Lecture 
XIX. 


254 


JOSHUA. 


Lect.  X 


went  before  him  through  the  land,  till  all  the  kings 
of  Canaan  were  subdued  beneath  his  feet. 

It  is  not  often,  either  in  sacred  or  common  history, 
His  name,  that  we  are  justified  in  pausing  on  anything 
so  outward  and  (usually)  so  accidental  as  a  name. 
But,  if  ever  there  be  an  exception,  it  is  in  the  case 
of  Joshua.  In  him  it  first  appears  with  an  appropri¬ 
ateness  which  the  narrative  describes  as  intentional. 
His  original  name,  Hoshea ,  “  salvation,”  is  transformed 
into  Jehoshua ,  or  Joshua ,  “  God’s  salvation  ;  ”  and  this, 
according  to  the  modifications  which  Hebrew  names 
underwent  in  their  passage  through  the  Greek  lan¬ 
guage,  took,  in  the  later  ages  of  the  Jewish  Church, 
sometimes  the  form  of  Jason ,  but  more  frequently  that 
which  has  now  become  indelibly  impressed  upon  his¬ 
tory  as  the  greatest  of  all  names  —  JESUS.1 

Slight  as  may  be  this  connection  between  the  first 
and  the  last  to  whom  this  name  was  given  with  any 
religious  significance,  it  demands  our  consideration  for 
the  sake  of  two  points  which  are  often  overlooked, 
and  which  may  in  this  relation  catch  the  attention 
of  those  who  might  else  overlook  them  altogether. 
One  is  the  prominence  into  which  it  brings  the  true 
meaning  of  the  sacred  Name,  as  a  deliverance,  not 
from  “  imputed  ”  or  “  future  ”  or  “  unknown  ”  dangers, 
but  from  enemies  as  real  as  the  Canaanitish  host. 
The  first  Joshua  was  to  save  his  people  from  their 
actual  foes.  The  Second  was  to  “save  His  people 
from  their  sins” 2  Again,  the  career  of  Joshua  gives  a 
note  of  preparation  for  the  singularly  martial,  soldier¬ 
like  aspect  —  also  often  forgotten  —  under  which  his 
Namesake  is  at  times  set  forth.  The  courage,  the 

1  LXX.  throughout,  and,  in  the  N. 

T.,  Acts  vii.  45  ;  Hebr.  iv.  8. 


2  Matt.  i.  21. 


Lect.  X. . 


THE  PASSAGE  OF  THE  JORDAN. 


255 


cheerfulness,  the  sense  of  victory  and  of  success,  which 
runs  both  through  the  actual  history  of  the  Gospels, 
and  through  the  idealization  of  it  in  “  the  Conqueror  ” 
of  the  writings  of  S.  John,1  finds  its  best  illustration 
from  the  older  church  in  the  character  and  career  of 
J  oshua. 

The  first  stage  of  Joshua’s  Conquest  was  the  occu¬ 
pation  of  the  vast  trench,  so  to  speak,  which  The  Pas- 

A  .  sage  the 

parted  them  from  the  mass  of  the  Promised  Jordan. 
Land.  Between  it  and  them  lay  the  deep  valley  of 
the  Jordan  with  its  mysterious  river.  “  To  pass  over 
“the  Jordan  and  go  in  and  possess  the  land,”  was  a 
crisis  in  their  fate,  such  as  they  had  not  experienced 
since  the  crossing  of  the  Red  Sea. 

The  scene  of  the  passage  of  the  Jordan  is  presented 
to  us  in  the  Sacred  narrative  in  a  form  so  distinct, 
and  at  the  same  time  so  different  from  that  which  is 
usually  set  forth  in  pictures  and  allegories,  that  it  shall 
here  be  given  at  length,  so  far  as  it  can  be  made  out 
from  the  several  notices  handed  down  to  us,  namely, 
the  two  separate  accounts  in  the  Book  of  Joshua,2 
further  varied  by  the  differences  between  the  Received 
Text  and  the  Septuagint,  the  narrative  of  Josephus, 
and  the  114th  Psalm. 

For  the  first  time  they  descended  from  the  upper 
terraces  of  the  valley,  they  “  removed  from  the  acacia 
“  groves  and  came  to  the  Jordan  and  c stayed  the  night’ 
“  there  before  they  passed  over.” 8 

It  wTas  probably  at  the  point  near  the  present  south- 

1  Not  only  in  the  Apocalypse  (ii.  our  Salvation  ”  (Heb.  ii.  10)  derives 
7,  11,  17,  26  ;  iii.  5,  12,  21  ;  v.  5  ;  vi.  its  martial  sound  only  from  the  Eng- 
25  xi.  7  ;  xii.  1 1  ;  xiii.  7 ;  xv.  2  ;  xvii.  lish,  not  from  the  original. 

14  ;  xxi.  7)  but  in  the  Gospel  (John  2  Josh.  iii.  3-17 ;  iv.  1-24. 
xvi.  33),  and  Epistles  (1  John  ii.  13,  3  Josh.  iii.  1 

14  ;  iv.  4  ;  v.  4,  5).  “  The  Captain  of 


256 


THE  PASSAGE  OF  THE  JORDAN. 


Lect.  X. 


ern  fords,  crossed  at  the  time  of  the  Christian  era  by  a 
The  river,  bridge.1  The  river  was  at  its  usual  state  of 
flood  at  the  spring  of  the  year,  so  as  to  fill  the  whole 
of  the  bed,  up  to  the  margin  of  the  jungle  with  which 
the  nearer  banks  are  lined.  On  the  broken  edge  of 
the  swollen  stream,  the  band  of  priests  stood  with  the 
Ark  on  their  shoulders.  At  the  distance  of  nearly  a 
mile  in  the  rear  was  the  mass  of  the  army.  Suddenly 
the  full  bed  of  the  Jordan  was  dried  before  them. 
High  up  the  river,  “  far,  far  away,” 2  “  in  Adam,  the 
“  city  which  is  beside  Zaretan,”  3  “  as  far  as  the  parts 
“  of  Kirjath-jearim,” 4  that  is,  at  a  distance  of  thirty 
miles  from  the  place  of  the  Israelite  encampment, 
“  the  waters  there  stood  which  ‘  descended  ’  6  from  the 
“  heights  above/  —  stood  and  rose  up,  as  if  gathered 
“  into  a  waterskin ; 5  as  if  in  a  barrier  or  heap,6  as  if 
“  congealed  ; 7  and  those  that  ‘  descended  ’  towards  the 
a  sea  of  ‘  the  desert,’  the  salt  sea,  failed  and  were  cut 
“  off”  Thus  the  scene  presented  is  of  the  “  descending 
“  stream  ”  (the  words  employed  seem  to  have  a  special 
reference  to  that  peculiar  and  most  significant  name 
of  the  M  Jordan  ”)  not  parted  asunder,  as  we  generally 
fancy,  but,  as  the  Psalm  expresses  it,8  “  turned  back- 


1  So  we  may  infer  from  Jos.  Ant. 
v.  i.  3. 

2  pcacpav  G(j)odpa  ctyodpug,  LXX. ;  Josh, 
iii.  16. 

3  Josh.  iii.  16.  Not  “  from  Adam,” 
hut  “  in  Adam.”  See  Keil  ad  loc. 
Zaretan  is  near  Succoth,  at  the  mouth 
of  the  Jabbok,  1  Kings  vii.  46. 

4  Josh.  iii.  16  (LXX.),  unless  this 

be  another  reading  for  Kirjath-Adam 

(the  citr  of  Adam).  [Comp.  Kiria- 

thaim,  in  the  same  neighborhood,  Gen. 

xiv.  5.] 


5  So  Symmachus’s  version,  as  the 
LXX.  in  Ps.  xxxiii.  7. 

6  The  word  here  used,  ned,  is  only 
used  of  “  water  ”  with  regard  to  the 
Jordan  river,  and  the  waves  of  the 
sea  poetically  (Ps.  xxxiii.  7  ;  Ex.  xv. 
8).  The  Vulgate  makes  this  to  be 
“  as  high  as  a  mountain.”  The  Sa¬ 
maritan  Joshua  makes  it  “  wave  ris- 
“ing  upon  wave  till  it  reached  the 
“  height  of  a  lofty  mountain.” 

7  JJ^yjua,  LXX. ;  Josh.  iii.  16 

8  Ps.  cxiv.  3. 


Lect.  X. 


THE  PASSAGE  OF  THE  JORDAN. 


257 


“  wards ;  ”  the  whole  bed  of  the  river  left  dry  from 
north  to  south,  through  its  long  windings ;  the  huge 
stones  lying  bare  here  and  there,  embedded  in  the 
soft  bottom ; 1  or  the  shingly  pebbles  drifted  along  the 
course  of  the  channel.2 

The  Ark  stood  above.  The  army  passed  below.  The 
women  and  children,  according  to  the  Jewish  The  Pas_ 
tradition,3  were  placed  in  the  centre,  from  the  sage‘ 
fear  lest  they  should  be  swept  away  by  the  violence 
of  the  current.  The  host,  at  different  points  probably, 
rushed  across.4  The  priests  remained  motionless,  their 
feet  sunk  in  the  deep  mud  of  the  channel.5  In  front, 
contrary  to  the  usual  order,6  as  if  to  secure  that  they 
should  fulfil  their  vow,  went  the  three  Transjordanic 
tribes.  They  were  thus  the  first  to  set  foot  on  the 
shore  beyond.  Their  own  memorial  of  the  passage 
was  the  monument  already  described.7  But  the  na¬ 
tional  memorial  was  on  a  larger  scale.  Carried  aloft 
before  the  priests  as  they  left  the  river-bed,8  were 
“  twelve  stones,”  selected  by  the  twelve  chiefs  of  the 
tribes.  These  were  planted  on  the  upper  terrace  of 
the  plain  of  the  Jordan,  and  became  the  centre  of  the 
first  sanctuary  of  the  Holy  Land,  —  the  first  place  pro¬ 
nounced  “holy,”  the  “sacred  place”  of  the  Jordan 
valley,9  where  the  tabernacle  remained  till  it  was 
fixed  at  Shiloh.10  Gilgal  long  retained  reminiscences  of 
its  ancient  sanctity.  The  twelve  stones  taken  up  from 


1  As  implied  in  Josh.  iv.  9,  18. 

2  Jos.  Ant.  v.  1,  §  3. 

3  Ibid. 

4  “  Hasted,”  Josh.  iv.  10. 

5  This  is  implied  in  the  word  trans¬ 

lated  “  lifted  up ;  ”  but  more  properly 

as  in  the  margin,  “  plucked  up.”  Josh, 

iv.  18. 


6  Num.  xxxii.  20  ;  Josh.  iv.  1 2. 

7  Lecture  IX. 

8  The  LXX.  reads  in  Josh.  iv.  11, 
“  the  stones,”  instead  of  “  the  priests.” 

9  Josh.  v.  13-15. 

10  Josh,  xviii.  1. 


33 


258 


GILGAL. 


Lect.  X. 


the  bed  of  the  Jordan  continued  at  least  till  the 
time  of  the  composition  of  the  Book  of  Joshua/  and 
seem  to  have  been  invested  with  a  reverence,  which 
came  to  be  regarded  at  last  as  idolatrous.2  The  name 
was  joined  with  that  of  the  aCacia  groves  on  the  far¬ 
ther  side,  in  the  title,  as  it  would  seem,  given  in  pop¬ 
ular  tradition  or  in  ancient  records,  to  this  passage  of 
the  history :  “  From  Shittim  to  Gilgal.” 3 

But  its  immediate  connection  was  with  the  first 
Giigai.  stage  of  the  Conquest.  The  touching  alle¬ 
gory  by  which  in  the  “  Pilgrim’s  Progress  ”  the  pas¬ 
sage  of  the  Jordan  is  made  the  likeness  of  the  pas¬ 
sage  of  the  river  of  Death  to  the  land  of  rest  beyond, 
has  but  a  slight  ground  in  the  language  of  the  Bible, 
or  the  course  of  the  history.  The  passage  of  the 
Jordan  was  not  the  end,  but  the  beginning  of  a  long 
and  troubled  conflict.  Of  this,  the  first  step  was  the 
occupation  of  Gilgal.  It  became  immediately  the 
frontier  fortress,  such  as  the  Greeks  under  the  name 
of  epiteichisma ,  and  the  Romans  under  the  name  of 
colonia ,  always  planted  as  their  advanced  posts  in  a 
hostile  country,  such  as  at  Kufa  the  Arab  conquerors 
founded  before  the  building  of  Bagdad,4  and  at  Fostat 
before  the  building  of  Cairo.  It  was  also,  as  Jose¬ 
phus  well  says,  the  “ place  of  freedom.”5  There  they 
cast  off  the  slough  of  their  wandering  life.  The  un- 
The  dr-  circumcised  state,  regarded  as  a  deep  reproach 
cumcision.  ^he  civilization  of  the  East,  was  now 

to  be  “  rolled  away.”  The  ancient  rite  was  performed 
once  more,  and  the  knives  of  flint  used  on  the  occa- 

1  Josh.  iv.  5.  For  the  question  of  2  Judg.  iii.  26  ;  Ilosea  iv.  15;  ix. 
the  double  memorial,  see  the  com-  15;  xii.  11;  Amos  iv.  4  ;  v.  5. 
mentators  on  this  place.  The  LXX.  3  Micah  vi.  5. 
text  (iv.  9)  supposes  two.  4  Ewald  ii.  244. 

5  Ant.  v.  1,  §  4. 


Lect.  X. 


JERICHO. 


259 


sion  were  preserved  as  sacred  relics.  The  hill  where 
the  ceremony  had  taken  place  —  one  of  the  many 
argillaceous  hills  on  the  terraces  of  the  valley  —  was 
called  by  a  name  commemorating  the  event,  as  was 
Gilgal  itself.1  A  Jewish  sect  is  reported  still  to  exist 
at  Bozra,  which  professes  to  have  broken  off  from  Is¬ 
rael  at  this  time.  They  are  said  to  abhor  not  only 
circumcision,  but  everything  which  can  remind  them 
of  it  —  all  cutting  with  knives,  even  at  meals.  One 
other  sign  of  the  desert  ceased  at  the  same  time. 
For  the  first  time  since  leaving  Sinai,  the  Passover 
was  celebrated,  and  the  cakes  were  made  no  longer 
of  manna,  but  of  the  corn  of  Palestine,  bread  found 
in  the  houses  of  the  old  inhabitants. 

It  was  on  Jericho  that  the  attention  of  Joshua  had 
been  already  fixed  before  the  Passage  of  the  Jericho. 
Jordan.  Following  the  plan  which  seems  to  have 
been  universal  in  the  warfare  of  those  times,  he  sent 
two  spies,  as  he  and  his  eleven  companions  had  once 
gone  before  from  the  south,  as  the  spies  were  after¬ 
wards  sent  to  explore  Ai2  and  Bethel.3  They,  like 
the  wild  Gadites  in  David’s  time,  swam  the  flooded 
river,  and  out  of  their  adventure  grew  the  one  gentle 
incident  of  this  part  of  the  history,  —  the  kindness 
and  honor  dealt  to  Bahab,  the  first  convert  to  the 
Jewish  faith. 

Jericho  was  the  most,  indeed  the  only,  important 
town  in  the  Jordan  valley.  Not  only  was  it  conspic¬ 
uous  amongst  the  other  Canaanitish  towns,  for  its 
walls  and  gates,  and  its  rich  temple,  filled  with  gold, 
silver,  iron,  brass,  and  even  Mesopotamian  drapery,4 
but  its  situation  was  such  as  must  always  have  ren- 


1  Jos.  Ant.  v.  3,  §  7. 
8  Josh.  vii.  2. 


3  Judg.  i.  23. 

4  Josh.  vii.  21. 


260 


FALL  OF  JERICHO. 


Lect.  X. 


dered  its  occupation  necessary  to  any  invader  from 
that  quarter.  It  was  the  key  of  Western  Palestine, 
as  standing  at  the  entrance  of  the  two  main  passes 
into  the  central  mountains.  From  the  issues  of  the 
torrent  of  the  Kelt  on  the  south,  to  the  copious 
spring,  afterwards  called  “the  fountain  of  Elisha,”  on 
the  north,  the  ancient  city  ran  along  the  base  of  the 
mountains,  and  thus  commanded  the  oasis  of  the 
desert  valley,  the  garden  or  park  of  verdure,  which 
clustering  round  these  waters  has,  through  the  various 
stages  of  its  long  existence,  secured  its  prosperity  and 
grandeur. 

Beautiful  as  the  spot  is  now  in  utter  neglect,  it 
must  have  been  far  more  so  when  it  was  first  seen 
by  the  Israelite  host  at  Gilgal.  Gilgal  was  about 
five  miles  distant  from  the  river  hanks;  at  the  east¬ 
ern  outskirts,  therefore,  of  the  great  forest.  Jericho 
itself  stood  at  its  western  extremity,  immediately  where 
the  springs  issue  from  the  hills.  From  that  scene  of 
their  earliest  settlement  in  Palestine,  the  Israelites 
looked  out  over  the  intervening  woods  to  what  was 
to  he  the  first  prize  of  the  conquest.  The  forest  it¬ 
self  did  not  then  consist,  as  now,  merely  of  the  pict¬ 
uresque  thorn,  but  was  a  vast  grove  of  majestic 
palms,  nearly  three  miles  broad,  and  eight  miles  long. 
It  must  have  recalled  to  the  few  survivors  of  the  old 
generation  the  magnificent  palm-groves  of  Egypt,  such 
as  may  now  be  seen  stretching  along  the  shores  of 
the  Nile  at  Memphis.  Amidst  this  forest  —  as  is,  to  a 
certain  extent,  the  case  even  now  —  would  have  been 
seen,  stretching  through  its  open  spaces,  fields  of  ripe 
corn ;  for  it  was  “  the  time  of  barley  harvest.”  Above 
the  topmost  trees  would  be  seen  the  high  walls  and 
towers  of  the  city,  which  from  that  grove  derived  its 


Lect.  X. 


JERICHO* 


261 


proud  name,  "  Jericho,  the  city  of  palms,”  "high,  and 
fenced  up  to  heaven”  Behind  the  city  rose  the  jag¬ 
ged  range  of  the  white  limestone  mountains  of  Judaea, 
here  presenting  one  of  the  few  varied  and  beautiful 
outlines  that  can  be  seen  amongst  the  southern  hills 
of  Palestine.  This  range  is  "  the  mountain  ”  to  which 
the  spies  had  fled  whilst  their  pursuers  vainly  sought 
them  on  the  way  to  the  Jordan. 

The  story  of  the  Fall  of  Jericho,  and  the  Passage 
of  the  Jordan,  carries  with  it  the  same  im-  its  fail, 
pression  as  that  of  the  Exodus ;  that  it  was  not  by 
their  own  power,  but  by  a  Higher,  that  the  Israelites 
were  to  effect  their  first  entrance  into  the  Promised 
Land.  Whatever  might  be  their  own  part  in  what 
followed  —  whatever  might  be  their  own  even  in  this 
—  the  sagacity  of  Joshua,  the  venturesomeness  of  the 
spies,  the  fidelity  of  Rahab,  the  seven  days’  march, 
the  well-known  and  terrible  war-cry ;  yet  the  river  is 
crossed,  and  the  city  falls,  by  other  means.  It  may 
be  that  these  means  were  found  in  the  resources  of 
the  natural  agencies  of  earthquake  or  volcanic  con¬ 
vulsion,1  which  mark  the  whole  of  the  Jordan  valley, 
from  Gennesareth  down  to  the  Dead  Sea,  and  which 
are  perpetually  recurring  in  its  course,  not  only  dur¬ 
ing  the  sacred  history,  but  to  our  own  time.  If  so, 
we  have  a  remarkable  illustration  and  confirmation 
of  the  narrative,  the  more  so,  because  the  secondary 
causes  of  these  phenomena  must  have  been  to  the 
sacred  historians  themselves  unknown.  But,  if  we  are 
denied  this  external  testimony  to  the  events,  the 
moral,  which  the  relation  of  them  is  intended  to 

1  Instances  —  obvious,  indeed,  with-  lustration  of  these  events,  by  Dr. 
out  any  special  enumeration  —  are  King,  in  his  Morsels  of  Criticism ,  iii. 
given  both  of  the  effect  on  waters  287,  305. 
and  on  cities,  by  earthquakes,  in  il- 


262 


FALL  OF  JERICHO. 


Lect.  X. 


teach,  and  which  no  doubt  it  did  teach,  remains  the 
same,  and  is  well  expressed  in  the  Psalm  of  later 
days: 

i 

“  We  have  heard  with  our  ears,  O  God  ; 

“  Our  fathers  have  told  us  what  Thou  didst  in  their  days,  in  the  times  of 
old : 

“  How  Thou  didst  drive  out  the  heathen  with  Thy  hand,  and  plantcdst 
them ; 

“  How  Thou  didst  afflict  the  people,  and  cast  them  out. 

“  For  they  got  not  the  land  in  possession  by  their  own  sword, 

“  Neither  did  their  own  arm  save  them ; 

“  But  Thy  right  hand,  and  Thine  arm,  and  the  light  of  Thy  countenance, 

“  Because  Thou  hadst  a  favour  unto  them.”  1 

The  ultimate  importance  of  the  fall  of  Jericho  is 
marked  by  the  consecration  of  its  spoil,  and  by  the 
curse  on  its  rebuilder.  But  its  immediate  conse¬ 
quences  lay  in  the  opening  which  it  afforded  for 
penetrating  into  the  hills  above.  It  was  a  critical 
moment,  for  it  was  exactly  at  the  similar  stage  of 
Fail  of  al  their  approach  to  Palestine  from  the  south, 
that  the  Israelites  had  met  with  the  severe  repulse 
at  Hormah,  which  had  driven  them  back  into  the 
desert  for  forty  years.  “  Joshua  ”  accordingly  “  sent 
“  men  from  Jericho  to  Ai,  which  is  beside  Bethaven, 
“  on  the  east  side  of  Bethel,  and  spake  unto  them, 
“  saying,  Go  up  and  view  the  country.”  The  precise 
position  of  Ai  is  unknown ;  but  this  indication  points 
out  its  probable  site  in  the  wild  entanglement  of  hill 
and  valley  at  the  head  of  the  ravines  running  up 
from  the  valley  of  the  Jordan.  The  two  attempts  of 
the  Israelites  that  followed  upon  the  report  of  the 
spies,  are  quite  in  accordance  with  the  natural  feat¬ 
ures  of  the  pass.  In  the  first  attempt  the  inhabi¬ 
tants  of  Ai,  taking  advantage  of  their  strong  position 


1  Ps.  xliv.  1-3. 


Lect.  X. 


FALL  OF  AI. 


263 


on  the  heights,  drove  the  invaders  “from  before  the 
gate,”  .  .  .  and  smote  them  in  “the  going  down” 
of  the  steep  descent.  In  the  second  attempt,  after  the 
Israelites  had  been  reassured  by  the  execution  of 
Achan  “in  the  valley  of  Achor,”  probably  one  of  the 
valleys  opening  into  the  Ghor,  the  attack  was  con¬ 
ducted  on  different  principles.  An  ambush  was 
placed  by  night  high  up  in  the  main  ravine  be¬ 
tween  Ai  and  Bethel.  Joshua  himself  took  up  his 
position  on  the  north  side  of  “  the  ravine,”  apparently 
the  deep  chasm  through  which  it  joins  the  ravine  of 
Jericho.  From  this  point  the  army  descended  into 
the  valley,  Joshua  himself,  it  would  seem,  remaining 
on  the  heights ;  and,  decoyed  by  them,  the  King  of 
Ai  with  his  forces  pursued  them  as  before  into  the 
“desert”  valley  of  the  Jordan;  whilst  the  ambush, 
at  the  signal  of  Joshua’s  uplifted  spear,  rushed  down 
on  the  city ;  and  then,  amidst  the  mingled  attack  at 
the  head  of  the  pass  from  behind,  and  the  return  of 
the  main  body  from  the  desert  of  the  Jordan,  the 
whole  population  of  Ai  w~as  destroyed.  A  heap  of 
ruins  on  its  site,  and  a  huge  cairn  over  the  grave  of 
its  last  king,1  remained  long  afterwards  as  the  sole 
memorials  of  the  destroyed  city. 

The  passes  were  now  secured,  and  the  interior  of 
the  country  was  accessible.  Two  peaceful  memorials 
remained  of  this  stage  of  the  conquest.  The  first 
was  the  adoption  of  Bahab  into  the  commu-  Rahab. 
nity.  “She  dwelleth  among  the  people  to  this  day.” 
The  stringency  of  the  Mosaic  law  prohibiting  inter¬ 
marriage  with  the  accursed  race  was  relaxed  in  her 
favor.  To  her  was  traced  back  the  princely  lineage 
of  David,  and  of  a  greater  than  David.  Her  trust  in 

1  Joshua  viii.  28,  29. 


264 


LEAGUE  WITH  GIBEON. 


Lect.  X. 


The 

Gibeonites. 


God,  and  her  friendly  hospitality  whilst  yet  a  hea¬ 
then,  were  treasured  up  by  the  better  spirits  of  the 
later  Jewish  and  early  Christian  Church,1  as  a  signal 
instance  of  the  universality  of  Divine  mercy  and  of 
religious  faith. 

The  other  was  the  league  with  the  Gibeonites. 
The  historical  peculiarities  of  this  transaction 
explain  themselves.  The  situation  and  char¬ 
acter  of  Gibeon  at  once  placed  it  in  an  exceptional 
position.  Planted  at  the  head  of  the  Pass  of  Beth- 
horon,  and  immediately  opposite  the  opening  of  the 
Pass  of  Ai,  it  would  have  been  the  next  prey  on 
which  the  Israelite  host  would  have  sprung.  On  the 
other  hand,  its  organization,  being  apparently  aristo¬ 
cratic,  or  federal,  —  itself  at  the  head  of  a  small 
band  of  kindred  cities,2  —  separated  it  from  the  inter¬ 
ests  of  the  royal  fortresses  of  the  rest  of  Palestine. 
Their  device  is  full  of  the  quaint  humor  which  marks 
its  antiquity.  It  is  observable  that  they  represent 
themselves  as  not  having  yet  heard  of  the  aggression 
on  Western  Palestine,  only  of  the  by-gone  conquest 
of  the  Amorite  kings  beyond  the  Jordan. 

The  remembrance  of  the  league  was  kept  up 
The  through  the  whole  course  of  the  subsequent 
league.  history.  The  massacre  of  the  Gibeonites  by 
Saul  was  not  excused  by  the  fact  that  they  were  an 
alien  race.  David  was  faithful  to  the  vow  which 
Joshua  had  first  made.  That  vow  and  its  observance, 
even  though  darkened  by  its  sanguinary  consequences 


1  Heb.  xi.  31 ;  James  ii.  25  ;  Clem.  Biblical  narrative  into  conformity 
Ep.  ad  Cor. ;  Lightfoot,  Hor.  Heb.  with  a  preconceived  hypothesis  of 
ad  Matt.  i.  5.  The  change  of  “  har-  the  perfection  of  everything  to  which 
lot  ”  into  “  hostess  ”  is  one  of  the  it  relates, 
many  attempts  made  in  later  times  2  Josh.  ix.  17. 
to  force  the  fearless  simplicity  of  the 


Lect.  X. 


LEAGUE  WITH  GIBEON. 


265 


in  the  sacrifice  of  the  sons  of  Saul,  stands  out  in  the 
careers  of  Joshua  and  of  David  as  an  example,  rare 
in  the  history  of  the  Christian  Church,  of  faith  kept 
with  heretics  and  infidels.  When  in  the  fifteenth 
century  Ladislaus  of  Hungary  had  made  a  solemn 
treaty  with  Amurath  II.,  and  when  tidings  arrived  of 
unlooked-for  succors  to  the  Christian  host,  no  less  a 
personage  than  Cardinal  Julian  Caesarini,  in  an  elabo¬ 
rate  argument,  urged  the  king  to  break  the  league.1 
The  chief  of  the  Polish  clergy,  in  a  spirit  more  worthy 
both  of  the  Old  and  the  New  Dispensation,  protested 
against  the  treacherous  act.  But  he  protested  alone, 
and  King  and  Cardinal  broke  their  plighted  faith, 
and  hurried  on  the  Christian  army  to  what  proved 
its  destruction.  Not  so  the  leaders  of  Israel  under 
Joshua,  when  public  opinion  clamored  for  vengeance 
on  the  Gibeonite  deceivers.  “  All  the  congregation 
“  murmured  against  the  princes.  But  all  the  princes 
“  said  unto  all  the  congregation,  We  have  sworn  unto 
“  them  by  the  Lord  God  of  Israel ;  now,  therefore,  we 
“  may  not  touch  them.  This  we  will  do  to  them :  we 
“  will  even  let  them  live,  lest  wrath  be  upon  us  be- 
“  cause  of  the  oath  which  we  sware  unto  them.” 2 

Their  lives  wrere  spared.  They  willingly  undertook 
the  tributary  service  which  was  levied  upon  them. 
Under  “  the  great  high  place  ”  on  which  the  Taber¬ 
nacle —  at  least  during  part  of  the  subsequent  his¬ 
tory  —  was  raised,  they  remained  in  after-times  a 
monument  of  this  early  league.  With  what  fidelity 
the  promise  was  observed,  and  with  what  important 
consequences,  will  be  best  seen  by  describing  the 
great  event  to  which  it  directly  led,  —  the  Battle  of 
Beth-horon. 

1  Life  of  Cardinal  Julian ,  pp.  329-341.  9  Josh.  ix.  18-20 

34 


266 


CONQUEST  OF  WESTERN  PALESTINE. 


Lect.  XI. 


LECTURE  XI. 

THE  CONQUEST  OF  WESTERN  PALESTINE  —  BATTLE  OF 

BETH-HORON. 

The  battle  of  Beth-horon  or  Gibeon  is  one  of  the 

Battle  of  most  important  in  the  history  of  the  world ; 
Beth-horon.  anq  so  profound  has  been  the  indiffer¬ 

ence,  first  of  the  religious  world,  and  then  (through 
their  example  or  influence)  of  the  common  world,  to 
the  historical  study  of  the  Hebrew  annals,  that  the 
very  name  of  this  great  battle  is  far  less  known  to 
most  of  us  than  that  of  Marathon  or  Cannae. 

It  is  one  of  the  few  military  engagements  which 
belong  equally  to  Ecclesiastical  and  to  Civil  History 
—  which  have  decided  equally  the  fortunes  of  the 
world  and  of  the  Church.  The  roll  will  be  complete 
if  to  this  we  add  two  or  three  more  which  we  shall 
encounter  in  the  Jewish  History;  and,  in  later  times, 
the  battle  of  the  Milvian  Bridge,  which  involved  the 
fall  of  Paganism;  the  battle  of  Poitiers,  which  sealed 
the  fall  of  Arianism;  the  battle  of  Bedr,  which  se¬ 
cured  the  rise  of  Mahometanism  in  Asia;  the  battle 
of  Tours,  which  checked  the  spread  of  Mahometanism 
in  Western  Europe;  the  battle  of  Lepanto,  which 
checked  it  in  Eastern  Europe ;  the  battle  of  Lutzen, 
which  determined  the  balance  of  powTer  between  Ro¬ 
man  Catholicism  and  Protestantism  in  Germany. 

The  kings  of  Palestine,  each  in  his  little  mountain 


Lect.  XI. 


BATTLE  OE  BETH-HORON. 


267 


fastness,  —  like  the  kings  of  early  Greece,  crowded 
thick  together  in  the  plains  of  Argos  and  of  Thebes, 
when  they  were  summoned  to  the  Trojan  war, — 
were  roused  by  the  tidings  that  the  approaches  to 
their  territory  in  the  Jordan  valley  and  in  the  passes 
leading  from  it  were  in  the  hand  of  the  enemy. 
Those  who  occupied  the  south  felt  that  the  crisis 
was  yet  more  imminent  when  they  heard  of  the  ca¬ 
pitulation  of  Gibeon.  Jebus,  or  Jerusalem,  even  in 
those  ancient  times,  was  recognized  as  their  centre. 
Its  chief  took  the  lead  of  the  hostile  confederacy. 
The  point  of  attack,  however,  was  not  the  invading 
army,  but  the  traitors  at  home.  Gibeon,  the  Siese  of 
recreant  city,  was  besieged.  The  continuance  Glbeon- 
or  the  raising  of  the  siege,  as  in  the  case  of  Orleans 
in  the  fifteenth  century,  and  Vienna  in  the  seven¬ 
teenth,  became  the  turning  question  of  the  war.  The 
summons  of  the  Gibeonites  to  Joshua  was  as  urgent 
as  words  can  describe,  and  gives  the  key-note  to  the 
whole  movement.  “  Slack  not  thy  hand  from  thy 
“  servants ;  come  up  to  us  quickly,  and  save  us,  and 
“  help  us ;  for  all  the  kings  of  the  Amorites  that 
“  dwell  in  the  mountains  are  gathered  together  against 
“  us.”  Not  a  moment  was  to  be  lost.  As  in  the  bat¬ 
tle  of  Marathon,  everything  depended  on  the  sudden¬ 
ness  of  the  blow  which  should  break  in  pieces  the 
hostile  confederation.  On  the  former  occasion  of 
Joshua’s  visit  to  Gibeon,  it  had  been  a  three  days’ 
journey  from  Gilgal,  as  according  to  the  slow  pace 
of  eastern  armies  and  caravans  it  might  well  be.  But 
now,  by  a  forced  march,  “Joshua  came  unto  them 
“  suddenly,  and  went  up  from  Gilgal  all  night.”  When 
the  sun  rose  behind  him,  he  was  already  in  the  open 
ground  at  the  foot  of  the  heights  of  Gibeon,  where 


268 


BATTLE  OF  BETH-HORON. 


Lect.  XI 


the  kings  were  encamped  (according  to  tradition1) 
by  a  spring  in  the  neighborhood.  The  towering  hill 
at  the  foot  of  which  Gibeon  lay,  rose  before  them  on 
the  west.  The  besieged  and  the  besiegers  alike  were 
taken  by  surprise.2 

As  often  before  and  after,  so  now,  “  not  a  man 

First  stage  “could  stand  before”  the  awe  and  the  panic 
of  the  battle.  0p  gudden  SOund  of  that  terrible  shout  — 

the  sudden  appearance  of  that  undaunted  host,  who 
came  with  the  assurance  not  “to  fear,  nor  to  be  dis- 
“  mayed,  but  to  be  strong  and  of  a  good  courage,  for 
“  the  Lord  had  delivered  their  enemies  into  their 
“  hands.”  The  Canaanites  fled  down  the  western  pass, 
and  “  the  Lord  discomfited  them  before  Israel,  and 
“  slew  them  with  a  great  slaughter  at  Gibeon,  and 
“  chased  them  along  the  way  that  goeth  up  to  Beth- 
“  horon  ”  This  was  the  first  stage  of  the  flight.  It 
is  a  long  rocky  ascent,3  sinking  and  rising  more  than 
once,  before  the  summit  is  reached.  From  the  sum¬ 
mit,  which  is  crowned  by  the  village  of  Upper  Beth- 
horon,  a  wide  view  opens  over  the  valley  of  Ajalon, 
of  “  Stags  ”  or  “  Gazelles,”  which  runs  in  from  the 
plain  of  Sharon.  Jaffa,  Ramleh,  Lydda,  are  all  visible 
beyond. 

“And  it  came  to  pass  as  they  fled  before  Israel, 
Second  “  and  were  in  the  qoinq  down  to  Beth-horon, 

stage  of  ^  d 

the  battle.  “  that  the  Lord  cast  down  great  stones  from 
“  heaven  upon  them  unto  Azekah.”  This  was  the 
second  stage  of  the  flight.  The  fugitives  had  out¬ 
stripped  the  pursuers ;  they  had  crossed  the  high  ridge 
of  Beth-horon  the  Upper ;  they  were  in  full  flight  to 

1  Josephus,  Ant.  v.  1,  §  17.  “battle:  God  is  His  name”  ( Samar - 

2  In  the  Samaritan  tradition  the  itan  Joshua,  ch.  20,  21). 

war-cry  was,  “  God  is  mighty  in  3  The  actual  amount  of  elevation  in 

this  ascent  is  perhaps  doubtful. 


Lect.  XI. 


BATTLE  OE  BETH-HORON. 


269 


Beth-horon  the  Nether.  It  is  a  rough,  rocky  road, 
sometimes  oyer  the  upturned  edges  of  the  limestone 
strata,  sometimes  over  sheets  of  smooth  rock,  some¬ 
times  over  loose  rectangular  stones,  sometimes  over 
steps  cut  in  the  rock.  It  was  as  they  fled  The  storm, 
down  this  slippery  descent,  that,  as  in  the  fight  of 
Barak  against  Sisera,  a  fearful  tempest,  “  thunder, 
“  lightning,  and  a  deluge  of  hail,” 1  broke  over  the 
disordered  ranks ;  “  they  were  more  which  died  of  the 
“  hailstones 2  than  they  whom  the  children  of  Israel 
u  slew  with  the  sword.” 

So,  as  it  would  seem,  ended  the  direct  narrative  of 
this  second  stage  of  the  flight.  But  at  this  point,  as 
in  the  case  of  the  defeat  of  Sisera,  we  have  one  of 
those  openings,  as  it  were,  in  the  structure  of  the 
Sacred  history,  which  reveal  to  us  a  glimpse  of  an¬ 
other,  probably  an  older,  version,  lying  below  the  sur¬ 
face  of  the  narrative.  In  the  victory  of  Barak,  we 
have  the  whole  account,  first  in  prose  and  then  in 
verse.  Here  we  have,  in  like  manner,  first,  the  prose 
account ;  and  then,  either  the  same  events,  or  the 
events  immediately  following,  related  in  poetry  — 
taken  from  one  of  the  lost  books  of  the  original 
canon  of  the  Jewish  Church,  the  Book  of  Jasher.3 

On  the  summit  of  the  pass,  where  is  now  the  ham¬ 
let  of  the  Upper  Beth-horon,  looking  far  down  Joshua,s 
the  deep  descent  of  the  Western  valleys,  with  Prayer* 

1  Jos.  Ant.  v.  1,  §  17.  Compare  3  We  know  this  book  only  from  the 
Judg.  iv.  15  ;  v.  20  ;  1  Sam.  vii.  10.  two  fragments  (Josh.  x.  12-14,  2  Sam. 

2  The  stones  have  been  interpreted  i.  17-27)  which  have  come  down 

as  meteoric  stones ;  but  the  explana-  to  us.  But,  according  to  a  probable 
tion  of  them  in  the  Hebrew  text,  and  conjecture,  first  started  by  Theodoret 
the  tradition  in  the  LXX.  and  Jose-  ( Qucestiones  in  Jesum  filiurn  Nave),  it 
phus,  are  decisive  in  favor  of  the  hail-  was  a  volume  containing  songs  of  the 
storm.  departed  “  heroes”  or  “just  ones.” 


270 


BATTLE  OF  BETH-HORON. 


Lect.  XI. 


the  green  vale  of  Ajalon  stretched  out  in  the  dis¬ 
tance,  and  the  wide  expanse  of  the  Mediterranean 
Sea  beyond,  stood,  as  is  intimated,  the  Israelite  chief. 
Below  him  was  rushing  down,  in  wild  confusion,  the 
Amorite  host.  Around  him  were  “  all  his  people  of 
war,  and  all  his  mighty  men  of  valor.”  Behind  him 
were  the  hills  which  hid  Gibeon  —  the  now  rescued 
Gibeon  —  from  his  sight.  But  the  sun  stood  high 
above  those  hills,  “in  the  midst  of  heaven,”1  for  the 
day  had  now  far  advanced,  since  he  had  emerged 
from  his  night-march  through  the  passes  of  Ai;  and 
in  front,  over  the  western  vale  of  Ajalon,  may  have 
been  the  faint  crescent  of  the  waning  moon,  visible 
above  the  hailstorm  driving  up  from  the  sea  in  the 
black  distance.  Was  the  enemy  to  escape  in  safety, 
or  was  the  speed  with  which  Joshua  had  “  come 
“  quickly,  and  saved  and  helped  ”  his  defenceless  allies, 
to  be  rewarded,  before  the  close  of  that  day,  by  a  sig¬ 
nal  and  decisive  victory  ? 

It  is  doubtless  so  standing  on  that  lofty  eminence, 
with  outstretched  hand  and  spear,  as  on  the  hill  above 
Ai,  that  the  Hero  appears  in  the  ancient  song  of  the 
Book  of  Heroes. 

“  Then  spake  Joshua  unto  Jehovah 

In  the  day  ‘  that  God  gave  up  the  Amorite 

Into  the  hand  of  Israel,’  (LXX.) 

When  He  discomfited  them  in  Gibeon, 

‘  And  they  were  discomfited  before  the  face  of  Israel.’  (LXX.) 

And  Joshua  said: 

‘  Be  thou  still,’  O  Sun,  upon  Gibeon, 

And,  thou  Moon,  upon  the  valley  of  Ajalon ! 

And  the  Sun  was  still, 

And  the  Moon  stood, 

1  If  the  expression  “  upon  Gibeon,”  “  the  midst  of  Heaven  ”  in  x.  13,  then 
in  Joshua  x.  12,  be  exact,  then  the  it  must  be  the  noon, 
early  morning  must  be  intended;  if 


Lect.  XI. 


THE  CAVE  OF  MAKKEDAH. 


271 


Until  ‘  the  nation  ’  (or  LXX.  ‘  until  God  ’)  had  avenged  them  upon  their 
enemies. 

And  the  sun  stood  in  ‘  the  very  midst’  of  the  heavens, 

And  hasted  not  to  go  down  for  a  whole  day. 

And  there  was  no  day  like  that  before  it  or  after  it, 

That  Jehovah  heard  the  voice  of  a  man, 

For  Jehovah  fought  for  Israel.1 

And  Joshua  returned,  and  all  Israel  with  him,  unto  the  camp  in  Gilgal.” 


So  ended  the  second  stage  of  the  flight.  In  the 
lengthened  day  thus  given  to  Joshua’s  prayer,  Third 
comes  the  third  stage.  “  The  Lord  smote  them  the  battle. 


“  to  Azekah  and  unto  Makkedah,  and  these  five  kings 
“  fled  and  hid  themselves  in  the  cave  at  Makkedah.” 
But  Joshua  halted  not  when  he  was  told;  the  same 
speed  was  still  required,  —  the  victory  was  not  yet 
won.  The  mouth  of  the  cave  was  blocked  by  huge 
stones,  and  a  guard  stationed  to  watch  it  whilst  the 
pursuit  was  continued.  We  know  not  pre-  The 
cisely  the  position  of  Makkedah ;  but  it  must  ter 
have  been,  probably,  at  the  point  where  the  kings> 
mountains  sink  into  the  plain,  that  this  last  struggle 
took  place ;  and  thither,  at  last,  “  all  the  people  of 
“  Israel  returned  in  peace ;  none  moved  his  tongue 
“  against  any  of  the  people  of  Israel.”  A  camp  was 
formed  round  the  royal  hiding-place.  It  was  a  well- 


1  I  have  given  at  length  what 
appears  to  be  the  extract  from  the 
Poetical  Book  (Josh.  x.  12-15).  In 
some  respects  it  seems  to  be  better 
preserved  in  the  LXX. ;  in  others,  in 
the  Received  Text.  The  LXX.  has 
given  the  first  portion  (verse  12)  in 
the  metrical  form,  which  the  Re¬ 
ceived  Text  has  reduced  to  prose; 
and  has  left  out  the  reference  to  the 
Book  of  Jasher,  which  the  Received 
Text  inserts  in  the  middle  of  the  ex¬ 
tract.  On  the  other  hand,  the  LXX. 


leaves  out  the  closing  verse  of  the  ex¬ 
tract  (verse  15),  from  the  just  feel¬ 
ing  that  it  interrupts  the  historical 
narrative  ;  but  apparently  overlook¬ 
ing  its  connection  with  the  distinct 
document  from  Jasher.  Besides  the 
metre  of  the  passage,  some  of  the 
phrases  seem  to  indicate  its  poetic 
character.  For  example,  the  unusual 
use  of  the  word  Goi  (nation),  for  the 
people  of  Israel  (in  verse  13),  and 
the  expression  of  the  sun  “  being  si¬ 
lent,”  as  if  awe-struck. 


272 


BATTLE  OF  BETH-HORON. 


Lect.  XI 


known  cave,  "the  cave,”1  overshadowed  by  a  grove 
of  trees.  The  five  kings  were  dragged  out  of  its  re¬ 
cesses,  for  the  first  time,  to  the  gaze  of  their  enemies. 
Their  names  and  cities  were  handed  down  in  various 
versions,2  to  later  times.  Hoham  or  Elam,  of  Hebron ; 
Piram  or  Phidon,  of  Jarmuth;  Japhia  or  Jephtha,  of 
Lachish  •  Dabir  or  Debir,  either  of  Eglon  or  Adullam : 
and  their  leader,  Adoni-zedek  or  Adoni-bezek,  of  Jeru¬ 
salem.  If  the  former  ("the  Lord  of  Righteousness”)  is 
the  name,  it  suggests  a  confirmation  of  the  tradition 
that  the  Salem  where  Melchi-zedek,  "the  King  of 
"Righteousness,”  reigned,  was  Jerusalem,  thus  confer¬ 
ring  on  its  rulers  a  kind  of  hereditary  designation.  If 
the  latter,  he  must  have  had  a  connection,  more  or  less 
close,  with  the  terrible  chief  who  had  seventy  cap¬ 
tive  princes  grovelling  under  his  table,3  after  the  sav¬ 
age  custom  of  Oriental  despots.  An  awe  is  described 
as  falling  on  the  Israelite  warriors,  when  they  saw 
the  prostrate  kings.  At  the  Conqueror’s  bidding,  they 
draw  near ;  and  according  to  the  usage  portrayed  in 
the  monuments  of  Assyria  and  Egypt,  planted  their 
feet  on  the  necks  of  their  enemies.  It  was  reserved 
for  Joshua  himself  to  slay  them.  The  dead  bodies 
were  hung  aloft,  each  on  its  own  separate  tree,  be¬ 
side  the  cave,  and  remained  (so  it  would  seem)  "  un¬ 
til  the  evening,”  when,  at  last,  that  memorable  sun 
"  went  down.”  The  cave  where  they  had  been  hid 
became  the  royal  sepulchre.  The  stones  which  on 
that  self-same  day  had  cut  them  off  from  escape, 
closed  the  mouth  of  their  tomb  ; 4  and  the  destruction 

1  The  cave  in  the  Hebrew  and  in  2  The  variations  appear  in  the 

the  LXX.  Josh.  x.  16,  17.  For  the  LXX. 

trees  see  x.  26.  3  Judg.  i.  7. 

4  See  Keil  on  Josh.  x.  27. 


Lect.  XI. 


ITS  IMPORTANCE. 


273 


of  the  neighboring  town  of  Makkedah  “on  that  day/’ 
completed  their  dreadful  obsequies. 

So  ended  the  day  to  which,  in  the  words  of  the 
ancient  sacred  song,  “  there  was  no  day  like,  before 
or  after  it.”1  The  possession  of  every  place,  sacred  for 
them  and  for  all  future  ages,  through  the  whole  centre 
and  south  of  Palestine,  —  Shechem,  Shiloh,  Gibeon, 
Bethlehem,  Hebron,  and  even  for  a  time,  Jerusalem, 
was  the  issue  of  that  conflict.  “And  all  these  kings 
“  and  their  land  did  Joshua  take  at  one  time,  because 
“the  Lord  God  fought  for  Israel”  “And  Joshua  re¬ 
turned,  and  all  Israel  with  him,  unto  the  camp  to 
“  Gilgal .” 2  It  is  the  only  incident  of  this  period  ex¬ 
pressly  noticed  in  the  later  books  of  the  Old  Testa¬ 
ment.  “  The  Lord  shall  rise  up  as  in  Mount  Perazim ; 
“  He  shall  be  wroth  as  in  the  valley  by  Gibeon .” 3  The 
very  day  of  the  week  was  fixed  in  later  tradi-  importance 

%/  i/  th© 

tions.  With  the  Samaritans  it  was  Thursday ; 4  Battle. 


1  This  first  victory  of  their  race 
may  well  have  inspirited  Judas  Mac¬ 
cabeus,  who,  himself  a  native  of  the 
neighboring  hills,  won  his  earliest 
fame  in  the  same  “  going  up  and 
coming  down  of  Beth-horon,”  where 
in  like  manner  “  the  residue  ”  of  the 
defeated  army  fled  into  “  the  plain,” 
“  into  the  land  of  the  Philistines.” 
And  again  over  the  same  plain  was 
carried  the  great  Roman  road  from 
Caesarea  to  Jerusalem,  up  which  Ces- 
tius  advanced  at  the  first  onset  of 
the  Roman  armies  on  the  capital  of 
Judaea,  and  down  which  he  and  his 
whole  force  were  driven  by  the  in¬ 
surgent  Jews.  By  a  singular  coin¬ 
cidence  the  same  scene  thus  wit¬ 
nessed  the  first  and  the  last  great 
victory  that  crowned  the  Jewish 

35 


arms  at  the  interval  of  nearly  fifteen 
hundred  years.  From  their  camp 
at  Gibeon,  the  Romans,  as  the  Ca- 
naanites  before  them,  were  dislodged ; 
they  fled  in  similar  confusion  down 
the  ravine  to  Beth-horon,  the  steep 
cliffs  and  the  rugged  road  rendering 
cavalry  unavailable  against  the  mer¬ 
ciless  fury  of  their  pursuers :  they 
were  only  saved  —  as  the  Canaanites 
were  not  saved  —  by  the  too  rapid 
descent  of  the  shades  of  night  over 
the  mountains,  and  under  the  cover 
of  those  shades  they  escaped  to  An- 
tipatris,  in  the  plain  below. 

2  Josh.  x.  28-43. 

3  Isa.  xxviii.  21. 

4  Sam.  Joshua ,  ch.  21,  where  the 
news  of  the  victory  was  brought  to 
Eleazar  by  a  carrier-pigeon. 


274 


BATTLE  OF  BETH-HOKON. 


Lect.  XI. 


with  the  Mussulmans  it  was  Friday;1  and  this  has 
been  given  as  a  reason  for  that  day  being  chosen  as 
the  sacred  day  of  Islam. 

Immediately  upon  its  close,  follows  the  rapid  suc¬ 
cession  of  victory  and  extermination  which  swept  the 
whole  of  Southern  Palestine  into  the  hands  of  Israel. 
It  is  probable,  indeed,  from  what  follows,2  either  that 
the  subjugation  and  destruction  were  less  complete 
than  this  narrative  would  imply,  or  that  the  deeds  of 
Joshua’s  companions  and  successors  are  here  ascribed 
to  himself  and  to  this  time.  But  the  concentration 
of  the  interest  of  the  conquest  on  this  one  event,  if 
not  chronologically  exact,  yet  no  doubt  justly  repre¬ 
sents  the  feeling  that  this  was  the  one  decisive  bat¬ 
tle,  involving  all  the  other  consequences  in  its  train. 

There  are  two  difficulties  which  have  been  occa- 
Difficuities.  sioned  by  this  event,  or  rather  by  its  inter¬ 
pretation,  which  have  not  been  without  influence  on 
the  history  of  the  Christian  Church. 

I.  The  first  has  arisen  from  the  words  of  Joshua, 
The  sun  “  Sun  ‘  be  thou  still  ’  on  Gibeon,  and  thou, 

standing 

still.  “  Moon,  over  the  valley  of  Ajalon :  or,  as 
read  in  the  Vulgate,  wffiich  first  gave  the  offence, 
“  Sun,  move  not  thou  towards  Gibeon,  nor  thou,  Moon, 
“  towards  the  valley  of  Ajalon.”  These  words  in  the 
Book  of  Joshua  were  doubtless  intended  to  express 
that  in  some  manner,  in  answer  to  Joshua’s  earnest 
prayer,  the  day  was  prolonged  till  the  victory  was 
achieved.  How,  or  in  what  way,  we  are  not  told: 
and  if  we  take  the  words  in  the  popular  and  poetical 

1  Buckingham’s  Travels ,  p.  302.  “  Joshua  made  war  a  long  time  with 

Jelaleddin,  Temple  of  Jerusalem,  287.  “  all  those  kings  ....  and  at  that 

2  For  example,  Hebron  and  Debir  “time  came  Joshua  and  cut  off  the 

are  taken  or  retaken  (Judg.  i.  10).  “  Anakims  from  the  mountains,  from 

Compare  also  Josh.  xi.  18-21 —  “  Hebron,  from  Debir,  &c.” 


Lect.  XI. 


THE  ASTRONOMICAL  DIFFICULTY. 


275 


sense  in  which  from  their  style  it  is  clear  that  they 
are  used,  there  is  no  occasion  for  inquiry.  That  some 
such  general  sense  is  what  was  understood  in  the 
ancient  Jewish  Church  itself,  is  evident  from  the 
slight  emphasis  laid  upon  the  incident  by  Josephus,1 
and  the  Samaritan  Book  of  Joshua ;  and  from  the  ab¬ 
sence  of  any  subsequent  allusion  to  it  (unless,  indeed, 
in  a  similar  poetic  strain2)  in  the  Old  or  New  Testa¬ 
ment.  But  in  later  times  men  were  not  content  with¬ 
out  taking  them  in  their  literal,  prosaic  sense,  and 
supposing  that  the  sun  and  the  moon  actually  stood 
still,  and  that  the  system  of  the  universe  was  arrested. 
It  was  this  interpretation  which  invested  the  passage 
with  a  new  and  alarming  importance  when  the  Coper- 
nican  system  was  set  forth  by  Galileo ;  when  it  ap¬ 
peared  that  the  sun,  being  always  stationary,  could 
not  be  said  to  stand  still  or  to  move.  Bound  this 
famous  prayer  was  fought  a  battle  of  words  in  eccle¬ 
siastical  history,  hardly  less  important  than  the  battle 
of  Joshua  and  the  Canaanites.  It  raged  through  the 
lifetime  of  Galileo ;  its  last  direct  traces  appear  in  the 
preface  of  the  Jesuits  to  their  edition  of  Newton’s 
Principia ,  defending  themselves  for  their  apparent,  but 
(as  they  state)  only  hypothetical,  sanction  of  a  theory 
which,  by  supposing  the  earth’s  motion,  runs  counter 
to  the  Papal  decrees.  It  continues  still  in  the  terrors 
awakened  in  many  religious  minds  by  the  analogous 
collisions  between  the  letter  of  Scripture  and  the  ad- 


1  Ant.  v.  1,  §  17.  “  He  then  heard 

“  that  God  was  helping  him,  by  the 
“  signs  of  thunder,  lightning,  and  un- 
“  usual  hailstones ;  and  that  the  day 
“  was  increased,  lest  the  night  should 
“  check  the  zeal  of  the  Hebrews.  .  .  . 
“  That  the  length  of  the  day  did  then 


“  increase,  and  was  longer  than  usual, 
“  is  told  in  the  books  laid  up  in  the 
“  Temple."  The  Samaritan  book  sim¬ 
ply  says,  “  that  the  day  was  prolonged 
“  at  his  prayer"  (ch.  20). 

2  Hab.  iii.  11. 


276 


BATTLE  OF  BETH-HORON. 


Lect.  XI 


vances  of  science  in  geology,  ethnology,  and  philol¬ 
ogy.  But,  in  fact,  the  victory  was  won  in  the  per- 
son  of  Galileo.  Even  the  Court  of  Rome  has  since 
admitted  its  mistake.  It  is  now  universally  acknowl¬ 
edged  that  on  that  occasion  “the  astronomers  were 
“  right  and  the  theologians  were  wrong.”  The  prin¬ 
ciple  was  then  once  for  all  established,  that  the  Bible 
was  not  intended  to  teach  scientific  truth.  This  inci¬ 
dent  in  the  Sacred  narrative  has  thus,  instead  of  a 
stumbling-block,  became  a  monument  of  the  recon¬ 
ciliation  of  religion  and  science ;  and  the  advance  in 
our  knowledge  of  the  Bible  since  that  time  has  still 
further  tended  to  diminish  the  collision  which  then 
seemed  so  frightful,  because  it  has  shown  us  far  more 
clearly  than  could  be  seen  in  former  times,  that  the 
language  employed  is  not  only  popular  but  poeti¬ 
cal  and  rhythmical;1  and  that  the  attempt  to  inter¬ 
pret  it  scientifically  is  based  on  a  total  misconception 
of  the  intention  of  the  words  themselves.  But,  even 
with  the  imperfect  knowledge  of  Biblical  criticism 
then  possessed,  the  defence  of  their  position  by  the 
two  great  astronomers  sums  up  the  question  in  terms 


1  It  is  well  known  that  various 
scientific  expedients  have  been  in¬ 
vented  to  solve  the  question.  Some 
have  imagined  a  long-prepared  scheme 
for  the  arrest  of  the  solar  system,  and 
a  succession  of  secret  miracles  to  avoid 
the  consequences  of  such  a  universal 
shock.  Others  have  supposed  a  re¬ 
fraction,  a  parhelion,  or  a  multiplica¬ 
tion  of  parhelions.  Others  have  seen 
in  the  passage  the  intimation  of  a  sus¬ 
pended  deluge.  To  those  who  may 
regard  any  of  these  explanations  as 
authorized  either  by  reason  or  Scrip¬ 
ture,  what  has  here  been  said  will  be 


superfluous.  But,  if  there  be  any  to 
whom  such  explanations  appear  not 
only  improbable  in  themselves,  but 
contrary  to  the  plain  tenor  of  the 
Sacred  narrative,  it  may  be  a  satis¬ 
faction  to  adopt  the  statement  given 
above,  which  is,  in  fact,  the  unan¬ 
imous  opinion  of  all  German  theo¬ 
logians  of  whatever  school.  The 
expression,  “  the  stars  in  their  courses 
“fought  against  Sisera”  (Judg.  v. 
20),  has  never  been  distorted  from 
its  true  poetical  character,  and  has, 
therefore,  given  rise  to  no  alarms  and 
no  speculations. 


Lect.  XI. 


THE  ASTRONOMICAL  DIFFICULTY. 


277 


which  not  only  meet  the  whole  of  this  case,  hut  ap¬ 
ply  to  any  further  questions  of  the  kind  which  may 
meet  us  hereafter. 

Galileo,  with  the  caution  which  belonged  to  his  char¬ 
acter  and  situation,  mainly  relies  on  the  author-  Answer  of 
ity  of  others.  But  these  were  almost  the  high-  Gflhleo- 
est  that  he  could  have  named.  The  first  is  Baronius,  the 
chief  ecclesiastical  historian  of  the  Roman  Church :  "  The 
" intention  of  Holy  Scripture  is  to  show  us  how  to  go 
"to  heaven,  not  to  show  us  how  the  heaven  goeth.”1 
The  second  was  Jerome,  the  author  of  the  most  ven¬ 
erable  translation  of  the  Bible :  "  Many  things  are 
"  spoken  in  Scripture  according  to  the  judgment  of 
"  those  times  wherein  they  were  acted,  and  not  ac- 
"  cording  to  that  which  truth  contained.” 2 

Kepler,  with  that  union  of  courage  and  piety  which 
marks  his  whole  career,  explains  the  text  him-  Answer  of 
self.  "  They  will  not  understand  that  the  only  Kepler' 
"thing  which  Joshua  prayed  for,  was  that  the  moun- 
"  tains  might  not  intercept  the  sun  from  him.  Be- 
"  sides,  it  had  been  very  unreasonable  at  that  time  to 
"think  of  astronomy,  or  of  the  errors  of  sight;  for  if 
"  any  one  had  told  him  that  the  sun  could  not  really 
"  move  on  the  valley  of  Ajalon,  but  only  in  relation  to 
"  sense,  would  not  Joshua  have  answered  that  his  de- 
"  sire  was  that  the  day  might  be  prolonged,  so  it  were 
"  by  any  means  whatsoever  ?  ”  3 

So  far  the  wise  astronomer  speaks  of  the  actual  his¬ 
toric  incident.  But  I  may  be  excused  for  adding  the 
conclusion  of  his  treatise,  in  words  equally  profitable  to 
the  learned  and  the  unlearned  student.  "He  who  is  so 
"  stupid  as  not  to  comprehend  the  science  of  astron- 

1  Galileo’s  Tract  on  rash  Citations  2  Jerome  (Ibid.  448). 
from  Scripture  (Salusbury’s  Mathe-  3  Kepler’s  Tract  (Ibid.  463.) 
matical  Tracts ,  i.  436.) 


278 


BATTLE  OF  BETH-HOBON. 


Lect.  XI 


“  omy,  or  so  weak  as  to  think  it  an  offence  of  piety 
“  to  adhere  to  Copernicus,  him  I  advise  —  that,  leav¬ 
ing  the  study  of  astronomy  and  censuring  the  opin- 
“  ions  of  philosophers  at  pleasure,  he  betake  himself 
“  to  his  own  concerns,  and  that  desisting  from  further 
“  pursuit  of  those  intricate  studies,  he  keep  at  home 
“  and  manure  his  own  ground ;  and  with  those  eyes 
“  wherewith  alone  he  seeth,  being  elevated  towards  this 
“  much-to-be-admired  heaven,  let  him  pour  forth  his 
“  whole  heart  in  thanks  and  praises  to  God  the  Cre- 
“  ator,  and  assure  himself  that  he  shall  therein  per¬ 
form  as  much  worship  to  God  as  the  astronomer  on 
“  whom  God  hath  bestowed  this  gift,  that  though  he 
*  seeth  more  clearly  with  the  eye  of  his  understand¬ 
ing,  yet  whatever  he  hath  attained  to  he  is  both 
“able  and  willing  to  behold  his  God  above  it. 

“  Thus  much  concerning  Scripture.  Now  as  touch- 
“  ing  the  authority  of  the  Fathers.  Sacred  was  Lac- 
“  tantius,  who  denied  the  earth’s  rotundity :  sacred  was 
“Augustine,  who  admitted  the  earth  to  be  round  but 
“  denied  the  antipodes :  sacred  is  the  liturgy  of  our 
“moderns,  who  admit  the  smallness  of  the  earth  but 
“  deny  its  motion.  But  to  me  more  sacred  than  all 
“  these  is  —  Truth.”  1 

II.  The  second  difficulty  is  that  which  belongs  to  the 
The  general  question  of  the  extermination  of  the  Ca- 
™atheCres  naanites;  but  which  is  brought  out  so  much 
Canaamtes.  more  forcibly  by  the  detail  of  the  successive 

massacres  which  followed  the  battle  of  Beth-horon, 
that  this  seems  the  best  place  for  considering  it. 

There  are  few  who  hear  the  closing  scenes  of  the 
10th  chapter  of  the  Book  of  Joshua  read  without  ask¬ 
ing  how  such  a  total  extirpation  could  have  been  car- 

1  Kepler  ( Salusbury’s  Mathematical  Tracts ,  i.  437). 


Lect.  XI. 


MORAL  DIFFICULTY. 


279 


ried  out  without  the  demoralization  of  those  concerned 
or  how  any  sanction  to  it  could  be  given  in  a  hook 
claiming  to  be,  at  least,  one  stage  in  the  Divine  rev¬ 
elations. 

Many  explanations  have  been  given  —  the  denial 
of  the  fact,  the  treatment  of  the  whole  as  an  allegory, 
the  alleged  parallels  in  the  promiscuous  destruction  of 
human  life  by  earthquake  and  pestilence. 

It  is  believed,  however,  that  most  reflecting  minds 
will  acquiesce  in  the  general  truth  of  an  answer  Answer  of 
given  long  ago  by  Chrysostom,  and  founded  on  tom. 
the  express  and  fundamental  teaching  of  Christ  and 
his  Apostles. 

He  is  speaking  of  the  verse  in  the  139th1  Psalm, 
—  “I  hate  them  with  a  perfect  hatred,”  and  wishes 
to  reconcile  it  with  the  duty  of  Christian  charity. 
“Now”  he  says,  “a  higher  philosophy  is  required  of 
"us  than  of  them.  ...  For  thus  they  are  ordered  to 
"  hate  not  only  impiety,  but  the  persons  of  the  im- 
"  pious,  lest  *  their  friendship  should  be  an  occasion  of 
"  going  astray.  Therefore  he  cut  off  all  intercourse, 
"  and  freed  them  on  every  side.” 

The  difference  in  this  respect  between  the  Old  and 
New  dispensation  is  laid  down  in  the  strongest  Answer  of 

■  °  our  Lord. 

manner  by  our  Lord  himself. 

"Ye  have  heard  that  it  hath  been  said,  An  eye  for 
"  an  eye,  and  a  tooth  for  a  tooth :  but  I  say  unto  you, 
"  That  ye  resist  not  evil :  but  whosoever  shall  smite 
"thee  on  thy  right  cheek,  turn  to  him  the  other 
"  also.”  2 

"  Ye  have  heard  that  it  hath  been  said,  Thou  shalt 
"  love  thy  neighbour,  and  hate  thine  enemy.  But  I  say 
"  unto  you,  Love  your  enemies,  bless  them  that  curse 

1  Chrysost.  on  1  Cor.  xiii.  2  Matt.  v.  38,  39. 


280 


BATTLE  OF  BETH-HOKON. 


Lect.  XI 


“you,  do  good  to  them  that  hate  you,  and  pray  for 
“  them  which  despitefully  use  you,  and  persecute  you ; 
“  that  ye  may  he  the  children  of  your  Father  which  is 
“  in  heaven :  for  he  maketh  his  sun  to  rise  on  the  evil 
“and  on  the  good,  and  sendeth  rain  on  the  just  and 
“  on  the  unjust.”  1 

“  And  wdien  His  disciples  James  and  John  saw  this, 
“  they  said,  Lord,  wilt  thou  that  we  command  fire  to 
“  come  down  from  heaven,  and  consume  them,  even  as 
“Elijah  did?  But  He  turned,  and  rebuked  them,2  and 
“said,  Ye  know  not  what  manner  of  spirit  ye  are  of. 
“For  the  Son  of  man  is  not  come  to  destroy  men’s 
“lives,  but  to  save  them” 

And  further,  that  this  inferiority  of  the  Old  dispen- 
Answer  of  sati°n  was  an  acknowledged  element  in  the 
to6t£pistle  “  gradualness  and  partialness  ”  of  Revelation, 
Hebrews,  inevitably  flows  from  the  definition  of  Reve¬ 
lation  as  given  by  the  author  of  the  Epistle  to  the 
Hebrews.  “  God  who  at  sundry  times  and  in  divers 
“  manners  spake  in  times  past  to  our  fathers.” 3 

How  necessary  this  accommodation  may  have  been 
niustra-  that  rude  age,  we  see  from  analogous 

ti°ns.  instances  in  later  history.  Not  only  in  the 
ancient  world  do  we  read,  even  approvingly,  of  like 
conduct  in  the  Homeric  or  the  early  Roman  heroes, 
hut  even  in  Christian  times  wTe  can  point  to  cases  in 
which  no  shock  has  been  given  to  the  general  moral 
sense  by  an  impulse  or  command  of  this  destructive 
character,  and  in  which  the  general  moral  character 
has  risen  above  this  particular  depression  of  its  hu- 
maner  instincts.  I  refer  not  merely  to  the  darker 


1  Matt.  v.  43-45.  But  they  must  represent  a  very  early 

2  Luke  ix.  54,  55,  56.  The  last  tradition, 

words  are  omitted  in  the  best  MSS.  3  Heb.  i.  1. 


Lect.  XI. 


THE  MORAL  DIFFICULTY. 


281 


periods  of  Christendom,  more  nearly  resembling  the 
Judaic  spirit  of  the  age  of  Joshua,  but  even  to  our 
own.  We  have  no  right  to  find  objections  to  these 
portions  of  the  Old  Testament,  when  we  acknowledge 
the  same  feelings  in  ourselves  or  others  without  repro¬ 
bation.  Two  instances  may  suffice. 

(1.)  In  the  late  Indian  mutiny,  at  the  time  when 
the  belief  in  the  Sepoy  atrocities  (since  ex- From  the 

1  J  \  Indian 

ploded)  prevailed  throughout  India,  it  will  be  mutiny, 
in  the  memory  of  some  that  letters  were  received 
from  India,  from  conscientious  and  religious  men,  con¬ 
taining  phrases  to  this  effect.  “  The  Book  of  Joshua  is 
a  now  being  read  in  church”  (in  the  season  when  this 
chapter  forms  one  of  the  first  Lessons  of  the  services 
of  the  Church  of  England).  "It  expresses  exactly 
"  what  we  are  all  feeling.  I  never  before  understood 
"  the  force  of  that  part  of  the  Bible.  It  is  the  only 
"  rule  for  us  to  follow.”  I  do  not  quote  this  senti¬ 
ment  to  approve  of  it.  I  quote  it  to  show  that 
what  could  be  felt,  even  for  a  moment,  by  civilized 
Christendom  now,  might  well  be  pardoned,  or  even 
commended,  in  Jewish  soldiers  three  thousand  years 
ago. 

(2.)  Oliver  Cromwell,  in  the  storming  of  Drogheda, 
ordered  an  almost  promiscuous  massacre  of  From 
the  Irish  inhabitants.  Of  the  act  itself  I  do  massacres  It 
not  speak.  It  is  now  generally  admitted  that  Urogheda’ 
the  Puritans  attached  an  undue  authority  to  the  de¬ 
tails  of  the  Jewish  Scriptures.  But  the  point  to  be 
observed  is,  that  Cromwell’s  act  has  received  a  high 
eulogy  in  our  own  time  from  one  who,  as  well  by  his 
genius  and  learning  as  by  his  command  of  the  sym¬ 
pathies  of  the  rising  generation,  in  a  great  measure 
represents  the  most  advanced  intelligence  of  our  age. 

36 


282 


BATTLE  OF  BETH-HORON. 


Lect.  XI. 


“  Oliver’s  proceedings  here  have  been  the  theme  of 
“  much  loud  criticism,  and  sibylline  execration,  into 
“  which  it  is  not  our  plan  to  enter  at  present.  Ter- 
“  rible  surgery  this;  but  is  it  surgery  and  judgment, 
“  or  atrocious  murder  merely  ?  That  is  a  question 
“  which  should  be  asked,  and  answered.  Oliver  Crom- 
“  well  did  believe  in  God’s  judgments ;  and  did  not 
“  believe  in  the  rose-water  plan  of  surgery  ;  —  which, 
“  in  fact,  is  this  editor’s  case  too  ! 

“  The  reader  of  Cromwell’s  Letters,  .  .  .  who  still 
“  looks  with  a  recognizing  eye  on  the  ways  of  the 
“  Supreme  Powers  with  this  world,  will  find  here,  in 
“  the  rude  practical  state,  a  phenomenon  which  he 
“  will  account  noteworthy.  An  armed  soldier,  solemnly 
“  conscious  to  himself  that  he  is  the  soldier  of  God 
“the  Just,  —  a  consciousness  which  it  well  beseems 
“  all  soldiers  and  all  men  to  have  always,  —  armed 
“  soldier,  terrible  as  Death,  relentless  as  Doom ;  doing 
“  God’s  judgments  on  the  enemies  of  God !  It  is  a 
“  phenomenon  not  of  joyful  nature ;  no,  but  of  aw- 
“  ful,  to  be  looked  at  with  pious  terror  and  awe.” 1 

Finally,  whether  we  justify  this  or  any  like  applica- 
The  moral  tion  of  Joshua’s  example  in  later  times,  there 
remains  (as,  indeed,  is  implied  in  the  passage 
just  quoted)  one  permanent  lesson,  —  the  duty  of 
keeping  alive  in  the  human  heart  the  sense  of  burn¬ 
ing  indignation  against  moral  evil,  —  against  selfish¬ 
ness,  against  injustice,  against  untruth,  in  ourselves 
as  well  as  in  others.  That  is  as  much  a  part  of  the 
Christian  as  of  the  Jewish  dispensation.  In  this  case, 
the  severe  curse  of  the  Psalm  on  which  Chrysostom 
comments  is  still  true.  “Do  not  I  hate  them  that 
“  hate  thee  ?  yea,  I  hate  them  with  a  perfect  hatred, 

1  Carlyle’s  Cromwell ,  ii.  453,  454. 


Lect.  XI. 


MORAL  LESSON. 


283 


"  even  as  though  they  were  mine  enemies  ”  It  is  im¬ 
portant  to  divide  between  the  evil  principle  and  the 
person  in  whose  mixed  character  the  evil  is  found. 
To  make  such  a  distinction  is  one  main  peculiarity 
of  the  Gospel.  But  it  is  also  important  to  hate  the 
evil  with  an  undivided  and  perfect  hatred.  “  A  good 
hater/’  in  this  sense,  is  a  character  required  alike 
by  the  Gospel  and  the  Law.  And  the  evil,  which,  ac¬ 
cording  to  the  imperfect  twilight  of  those  times,  was 
confounded  with  those  in  whom  it  was  personified, 
was  one  which  even  at  this  distance  we  see  to  have 
been  of  portentous  magnitude.  It  has  been  well 
shown  that  the  results  of  the  discipline  of  the  Jew¬ 
ish  nation  may  be  summed  up  in  two  points,  —  a 
settled  national  belief  in  the  unity  and  spirituality  of 
God,  and  an  acknowledgment  of  the  paramount  im¬ 
portance  of  purity,  as  a  part  of  morality;  and  further, 
that  these  two  ideas  are  cardinal  points  in  the  edu¬ 
cation  of  the  world.1  It  was  these  two  points  espe¬ 
cially  which  were  endangered  by  the  contact  and 
contamination  of  the  idolatry  and  the  sensuality  of 
the  Phoenician  tribes.  "It  is  better”  —  so  spoke  a  theo¬ 
logian  of  no  fanatical  tendency,2  in  a  strain,  it  may  be, 
of  excessive,  but  still  of  noble  indignation  —  “  it  is 
"  better  that  the  wicked  should  be  destroyed  a  hun- 
"  dred  times  over  than  that  they  should  tempt  those 
"  who  are  as  yet  innocent  to  join  their  company. 
"  Let  us  but  think  what  might  have  been  our  fate, 
"  and  the  fate  of  every  other  nation  under  heaven  at 
"  this  hour,  had  the  sword  of  the  Israelites  done  its 
"  work  more  sparingly.  Even  as  it  was,  the  small 
"  portions  of  the  Canaanites  who  were  left,  and  the 

1  See  Dr.  Temple’s  Essay  on  the  2  Arnold’s  Sermons,  vi.  35-37, 
Education  of  the  World,  11-13.  “  Wars  of  the  Israelites.” 


284  BATTLE  OF  BETH-HORON.  Lect.  XI 

“nations  around  them,  so  tempted  the  Israelites  by 
“  their  idolatrous  practices,  that  we  read  continually 
“  of  the  whole  people  of  God  turning  away  from  his 
“  service.  But  had  the  heathen  lived  in  the  land  in 
“  equal  numbers,  and,  still  more,  had  they  intermar- 
“  ried  largely  with  the  Israelites,  how  was  it  possible, 
“humanly  speaking,  that  any  sparks  of  the  light  of 
“  God’s  truth  should  have  survived  to  the  coming  of 
“Christ?  Would  not  the  Israelites  have  lost  all  their 
“  peculiar  character  ?  and  if  they  had  retained  the 
“name  of  Jehovah  as  of  their  God,  would  they  not 
“have  formed  as  unworthy  notions  of  his  attributes, 
“  and  worshipped  him  with  a  worship  as  abominable, 
“  as  that  which  the  Moabites  paid  to  Chemosh,  or 
“  the  Philistines  to  Dagon  ? 

“  But  this  was  not  to  be,  and  therefore  the  nations 
“  of  Canaan  were  to  be  cut  off  utterly.  The  Israel- 
“  ites’  sword,  in  its  bloodiest  executions,  wrought  a 
“  work  of  mercy  for  all  the  countries  of  the  earth  to 
“  the  very  end  of  the  world.  They  seem  of  very 
“  small  importance  to  us  now,  those  perpetual  contests 
“  with  the  Canaanites,  and  the  Midianites,  and  the 
“  Ammonites,  and  the  Philistines,  with  which  the  Books 
“  of  Joshua  and  Judges  and  Samuel  are  almost  filled. 
“We  may  half  wonder  that  God  should  have  inter¬ 
fered  in  such  quarrels,  or  have  changed  the  course 
“  of  nature,  in  order  to  give  one  of  the  nations  of 
“  Palestine  the  victory  over  another.  But  in  these 
“  contests,  on  the  fate  of  one  of  these  nations  of  Pal- 
“  estine,  the  happiness  of  the  human  race  depended. 
“  The  Israelites  fought  not  for  themselves  only,  but 
“for  us.  It  might  follow  that  they  should  thus  be 
“  accounted  the  enemies  of  all  mankind,  —  it  might 
“be  that  they  were  tempted  by  their  very  distinct- 


Lect.  XI.  THE  MORAL  LESSON.  285 

“  ness  to  despise  other  nations ;  still  they  did  God’s 
“  work,  —  still  they  preserved  unhurt  the  seed  of 
“  eternal  life,  and  were  the  ministers  of  blessing  to 
“  all  other  nations,  even  though  they  themselves  failed 
a.  to  enjoy  it.” 


286 


THE  BATTLE  OE  MEEOM. 


Lect.  XII. 


LECTURE  XII. 

THE  BATTLE  OF  MEROM  AND  SETTLEMENT  OF  THE 

TRIBES. 

The  battle  of  Beth-horon  is  represented  as  the  most 
important  battle  of  the  Conquest,  because,  being  the 
first,  it  struck  the  decisive  blow.  But,  in  all  such 
struggles,  there  is  usually  one  last  effort  made  for  the 
defeated  cause.  This,  in  the  subjugation  of  Canaan, 
was  the  battle  of  Merom. 

It  was  a  tradition  floating  in  the  Gentile  world,  that 
at  the  time  of  the  irruption  of  Israel,  the  Canaanites 
were  under  the  dominion  of  a  single  king.1  This  is 
inconsistent  with  the  number  of  chiefs  who  appear  in 
the  Book  of  Joshua.  But  there  was  one  such,  who 
appears  in  the  final  struggle,  in  conformity  with  the 
Phoenician  version  of  the  event.  High  up  in  the  north 
Hazor.  was  the  fortress  of  Hazor ;  and  in  early  times 
the  king  who  reigned  there  had  been  regarded  as  the 
head  of  all  the  others.2  He  bore  the  hereditary  name 
of  Jabin  or  “  the  Wise,”  and  his  title  indicated  his 
supremacy  over  the  whole  country,  “  the  King  of  Ca¬ 
naan”3  Its  most  probable  situation  is  on  one  of  the 
rocky  heights  of  the  northernmost  valley  of  the  Jor¬ 
dan.  The  name  still  lingers  in  various  localities  along 
that  region.  One  of  these  spots  is  naturally  marked 
out  for  a  capital  by  its  beauty,  its  strength,  as  well 

1  Suidas,  in  voce  Canaan.  2  Josh.  xi.  10.  3  Judg.  iv.  2,  23. 


Lect.  XII. 


THE  BATTLE  OF  MEROM. 


287 


as  by  the  indispensable  sign  of  Eastern  power  and 
civilization  —  an  inexhaustible  source  of  living  water,1 
and  there  in  later  times  arose  the  towrn  of  Caesarea 
Philippi,  from  which,  in  Jewish  tradition,  Jabin  was 
sometimes  called  the  King  of  Caesarea.  On  the  other 
hand,  the  place  which  Hazor  holds  in  the  catalogues 
of  the  cities  of  Naphtali 2  points  to  a  situation  farther 
south,  and  on  the  western  side  of  the  plain.  Which¬ 
ever  spot  be  regarded  as  the  residence  of  Jabin,  it 
was  under  his  auspices  that  the  final  gather-  Gathering 
ing  of  the  Canaanite  race  came  to  pass.  Round  £fa^®nite 
him  were  assembled  the  heads  of  all  the  tribes  kings- 
who  had  not  yet  fallen  under  Joshua’s  sword.  As  the 
British  chiefs  were  driven  to  the  Land’s  End  before 
the  advance  of  the  Saxon,  so  at  this  Land’s  End  of 
Palestine  were  gathered  for  this  last  struggle,  not  only 
the  kings  of  the  north,  in  the  immediate  neighbor¬ 
hood,  but  from  the  desert-valley  of  the  Jordan  south 
of  the  sea  of  Galilee,  from  the  maritime  plain  of  Phi- 
listia,  from  the  heights  above  Sharon,  and  from  the 
still  unconquered  Jebus,  to  the  Hivite  who  dwelt  “  in 
“  the  valley  of  Baalgad  under  Hermon ;  ”  all  these 
“  went  out,  they  and  all  their  hosts  with  them,  even 
“  as  the  sand  that  is  upon  the  sea-shore  in  multitude, 
“  .  .  .  and  when  all  these  kings  were  met  together, 

“  they  came  and  pitched  together  at  the  waters  of 
“  Merom  to  fight  against  Israel.” 

The  new  and  striking  feature  of  this  battle,  as  dis¬ 
tinct  from  those  of  Ai  and  Gibeon,  consisted  in  the 
“  horses  and  chariots  very  many,”  which  now  for  the 
first  time  appear  in  the  Canaanite  warfare ;  and  it  was 
the  use  of  these  which  probably  fixed  the  scene  of 

i  See  Sinai  and  Palestine,  397.  2  Josh.  xix.  35-37;  2  Kings  xv. 

29.  See  Robinson,  Bibl.  Res.  iii.  365. 


288 


THE  BATTLE  OF  MEROM. 


Lect.  XII 


the  encampment  by  the  lake,  along  whose  level  shores 
they  could  have  full  play  for  their  force.  It  was  this 
new  phase  of  war  which  called  forth  the  special  com¬ 
mand  to  Joshua,  nowhere  else  recorded  :  “  Thou  shalt 
“  hough  their  horses,  and  burn  their  chariots  with  fire.” 

Nothing  is  told  us  of  his  previous  movements.  Even 
the  scene  of  the  battle  is  uncertain.  “  The  waters  of 
Merom  ”  have  been  usually  identified  with  the  upper¬ 
most  of  the  three  lakes  in  the  Jordan  valley,  called 
by  the  Greeks  “  Samachonitis,”  and  by  the  Arabs  “  Hu- 
leh.”  Its  neighborhood  to  what  under  any  hypothesis 
must  be  the  site  of  Hazor  renders  this  probable.  But 
on  the  other  hand,  the  expressions  both  of  Josephus 
and  of  the  Sacred  narrative  point  in  a  somewhat  dif¬ 
ferent  direction ; 1  and  it  is  therefore  safer  to  consider 
it  as  an  open  question  whether  the  fight  actually  took 

The  Battle  place  on  the  shores  of  the  lake,  or  by  a  spring 
of  Merom.  or  weq  on  Up]an(j  plain  which  overhangs 

it.  The  suddenness  of  Joshua’s  appearance  reminds  us 
of  the  rapid  movement  by  which  he  raised  the  siege 
of  Gibeon.  He  came,  we  know  not  whence  or  how, 
within  a  day’s  march  on  the  night  before ;  and  then 
on  the  morrow,  “  dropped  ”  like  a  thunderbolt  upon 
them  “  in  the  mountain  ” 2  slopes  before  they  had  time 
to  rally  on  the  level  ground.  Now  for  the  first  time 
was  brought  face  to  face  the  infantry  of  Israel  against 
the  cavalry  and  war-chariots  of  Canaan.  No  details 
of  the  battle  are  given  —  the  results  alone  remain. 
u  The  Lord  delivered  them  into  the  hand  of  Israel, 
“who  smote  them  and  chased  them,”  by  what  passes 

1  Josephus,  who  mentions  the  Lake  18).  The  expression  “  waters  ”  (Josh. 
Samachonitis  in  Ant.  v.  5,  1,  omits  all  xi.  7)  is  never  used  elsewhere  for  a 
mention  of  it  here,  and  speaks  of  the  lake, 
battle  as  fought  at  Beeroth  (the  wells),  2  Josh.  xi.  7.  (LXX.) 
near  Kadesh  Naphtali  (Ant.  v.  1,  § 


Lect.  XII. 


SETTLEMENT  OF  THE  TRIBES. 


289 


we  know  not,  westward  to  the  friendly  Sidon,  and  east¬ 
ward  to  the  plain,  wherever  it  be,  of  Massoch  or  Miz- 
peh.1  The  rout  was  complete,  and  the  dumb  instru¬ 
ments  of  Canaanite  warfare  were  here  visited  with  the 
same  extremities  which  elsewhere  we  find  applied  only 
to  the  living  inhabitants.  The  chariots  were  burnt  as 
accursed.  The  horses,  only  known  as  the  fierce  ani¬ 
mals  of  war  and  bloodshed,2  and  the  symbols  of  foreign 
dominion,  were  rendered  incapable  of  any  further  use. 
The  war  was  closed  with  the  capture  of  Hazor.  Its 
king  was  taken,  and,  unlike  his  brethren  of  the  south, 
who  were  hanged  or  crucified,  underwent  the  nobler 
death  of  beheading.3  This  city,  chief  of  all  those 
taken  in  this  campaign,  was,  like  Ai,  burnt  to  the 
ground.4 

II.  And  now  came  the  apportionment  of  the  terri¬ 
tory  among  the  tribes,  which  has  made  the  lat-  Settlement 
ter  half  of  the  Book  of  Joshua  the  geograph-  tribes, 
ical  manual  of  the  Holy  Land,  the  Domesday-Book  of 
the  Conquest  of  Palestine. 

Two  principles  have  been  adopted  in  the  division 
of  land  by  the  conquerors  of  a  new  territory  —  one, 
specially  characteristic  of  the  modern  world,  and  ex¬ 
emplified  in  the  Norman  occupation  of  England,  by 
which  the  several  chiefs  appropriated  portions  of  the 
newly  conquered  country,  according  to  their  own  power 
or  will ;  the  other,  specially  characteristic  of  the  ancient 
world,  and  exemplified  in  Greece  and  Rome,  where  an 
equal  assignment  to  the  different  portions  of  the  con¬ 
quering  race  took  effect  by  the  deliberate  act  of  the 

1  Josh.  xi.  8.  (LXX.)  every  subsequent  mention  of  it.  See 

2  This  is  the  first  appearance  of  the  “  Horse  ”  in  Dictionary  of  the  Bible . 

horse  in  the  Jewish  history.  What  3  Josh.  xi.  10. 

is  here  said  is  borne  out  by  almost  4  Ibid.  11. 

37 


290 


SETTLEMENT  OF  THE  TRIBES. 


Lect.  XIL 


State.  Both  of  these  modes  were  adopted  m  the  ah 
lotment  of  land  in  Palestine ;  though,  as  might  be  ex- 
pected,  the  latter  principle  prevailed.1 

The  first  of  these  methods  is  seen  in  the  predatory 
Separate  expeditions  of  individuals  to  occupy  particular 
conquests.  Sp0£s  hitherto  unconquered,  or  to  reclaim  those, 

of  which  the  inhabitants  had  again  revolted.  Of  this 
kind  were  apparently  the  conquests  in  the  Transjor- 
jairand  danic  territory,  already  mentioned,2  by  Jair  and 
Nobah.  Another  instance,  which  belongs  more 
properly  to  the  next  Lecture,  and  which  was  the  last 
Dan.  wave  of  the  Israelite  migration,  is  that  of  the 
Danite  expedition  to  the  north.3  A  third  is  the  attack 
Attack  on  °f  the  Lphraimites  on  the  ancient  sanctuary 
Bethel.  0f  ]3etbel.  Its  capture,  briefly  told,  is  a  repe¬ 
tition  of  the  capture  of  Jericho.  The  spies  go  before ; 
a  friendly  Canaanite  encounters  them ;  the  town  is 
stormed  and  sacked ;  the  betrayer  of  the  place  escapes, 
like  Rahab ;  and,  like  her,  has  a  portion  assigned  to 
his  inheritance  “in  the  land  of  the  Hittites.”  But  the 
Judah.  chief  instance  is  in  the  tribe  of  Judah.  It  is 
in  these  early  adventures  that  this  great  tribe  first  ap¬ 
pears  before  us.  Its  vast  prospects  are  still  in  the  dis¬ 
tant  future,  beyond  the  limits  of  the  period  comprised 
in  this  volume.  Yet  to  this  first  appearance  of  Judah 
belongs  the  beginning  of  the  Jewish  Church,  properly 
so  called.  It  is  by  a  pardonable  anachronism  that  we 
extend  the  word  to  the  whole  of  the  nation.  But  we 
must  not  the  less  distinctly  mark  the  point  when  the 
name  of  “Judah”  or  “Jew”  first  rises  above  the  hori¬ 
zon,  destined  to  bear  in  after-years  so  vast  an  alter¬ 
nate  burden  of  honor  and  of  shame.  The  founder,  so 
Caleb.  to  speak,  of  the  glories  of  Judah  was  not  un- 

1  See  Arnold’s  Rome ,  i.  265.  2  See  Lecture  IX.  3  See  Lecture  XIII. 


Lect.  XII. 


CALEB. 


291 


worthy  of  its  later  fame.  Caleb,  in  the  Desert,  is  hardly 
known.  It  may  he,  as  has  been  conjectured  from  some 
of  the  links  in  his  descent,  that,  though  occupying  this 
exalted  place  in  the  tribe  of  Judah,  he  obtained  it  in 
the  first  instance  by  adoption  rather  than  by  birth.  He 
is  said  to  “have  his  part  and  his  inheritance  among 
“  the  children  of  Judah,”  not  as  by  right  but  “  because 
“he  wholly  followed  Jehovah  the  God  of  Israel.”1  And 
the  names  of  Kenaz,  Shobal,  Hezron,  Jephunneh,  amongst 
his  forefathers  or  his  progeny,  all  point  to  an  Idumean, 
rather  than  an  Israelite  origin.2  If  so,  we  have  a 
breadth  given  to  the  name  of  Judah,  even  from  its 
very  first  start,  such  as  we  have  already  noticed  in 
the  case  of  Abraham.  But,  Israelite  or  proselyte,  he 
was  the  one  tried  companion  of  Joshua,  and  his  claims 
rested  on  a  yet  earlier  and  greater  sanction,  that  of 
Moses  himself.  He  was  to  have  a  portion  of  the  land, 
on  which  “  his  feet  had  trodden.”  3 

The  spot,  on  which  Caleb  had  set  his  heart,  was  the 
fertile  valley  of  Hebron.  Of  all  the  country  Hebron, 
which  the  twelve  spies,  with  Joshua  and  Caleb  at 
their  head,  had  traversed,  this  is  the  one  scene  which 
remains  fixed  in  the  sacred  narrative,  as  if  because 
fixed  in  the  memory  of  those  who  made  their  report. 
There  was  the  one  field  in  the  whole  land  which  they 
might  fairly  call  their  own,  —  the  field  which  contained 
the  rocky  cave  of  Machpelah,  with  the  graves  of  their 
first  ancestors.  But  it  was  not  even  this  sacred  enclos¬ 
ure  which  had  most  powerfully  impressed  the  simple 
explorers  of  that  childlike  age.  It  was  the  winding 
valley,  whose  terraces  were  covered  with  the  rich  verd- 

1  Josh.  xiv.  9-14  ;  xv.  13.  on  “  Caleb”  in  Dictionary  of  the  Bible , 

8  See  Lord  Arthur  Hervey’s  article  and  Ewald,  i.  338. 

3  Joshua  xiv.  9. 


292 


SETTLEMENT  OF  THE  TRIBES. 


Lect.  XIL 


ure  and  the  golden  clusters  of  the  Syrian  vine,  so 
rarely  seen  in  Egypt,  so  beautiful  a  vesture  of  the 
bare  hills  of  Palestine.  In  its  rocky  hills  are  still  to 
be  seen  hewn  the  ancient  wine-presses.  Thence  came 
the  gigantic  cluster,3  the  one  relic  of  the  Promised 
Land,  which  was  laid  at  the  feet  of  Moses.  Thither, 
now  that  he  found  himself  within  that  land,  Caleb  was 
resolved  to  return.  In  that  valley  of  vineyards  —  in 
that  primeval  seat,  as  it  was  supposed,  of  the  vine 
itself  —  “  by  the  choice  vine,  Judah  was  to  bind  his 
“  foal ;  he  was  to  wash  his  garments  in  wine,  his  clothes 
“  in  the  blood  of  grapes.”  This  was  the  prize  for  Caleb. 
This  he  claimed  from  Joshua.  But  he  was  to  win  it 
for  himself,  and  it  was  no  easy  task.  It  was  the  main 
fastness  of  the  aboriginal  inhabitants  of  the  South. 
Even,  as  it  might  seem,  after  the  Canaanites  had  fled, 
the  chiefs  of  the  older  race  still  lingered  there.  It  was 
the  city  of  u  the  Four  Giants  ”  —  Anak  and  his  three 
gigantic  sons.  Within  its  walls  the  Last  of  the  Anakim 
held  out  against  the  conquerors.  But  thrice  over  the 
old  wTarrior  of  Judah  insists  on  his  unbroken  “  strength.” 
A  pitched  battle  takes  place  outside  the  walls;2  he 
drives  them  out;  and  Kirjath-Arba,  with  all  its  ancient 
recollections,  becomes  ee  Hebron,”  the  centre  of  the 
mighty  tribe,  which  was  there  to  take  up  its  chief 
abode.  Far  and  wide  his  name  extended,  and,  alone 
of  all  the  conquerors  on  the  west  of  the  Jordan,  he 
succeeded  in  identifying  it  with  the  territory  which 
he  had  won.3  But  this  was  but  the  nucleus  of  a  circle 
of  the  like  spirit  of  adventure,  radiating  from  this 
centre.  South  of  Hebron  lay  a  sacred  oracular  place, 
as  it  would  seem,  “  The  oracle,”  u  the  city  of  books,” 

1  Num.  xiii.  22-24.  2  Judg.  i.  10  :  “  And  Hebron  came 

3  1  Sam.  xxv.  3 ;  xxx.  14.  “  forth  against  Judah.”  (LXX.) 


Lect.  XII. 


KIRJATH-SEPHER. 


293 


Debir,1  Kirjath-sepher.  On  this  too  Caleb  fixed  his 
heart;  and  announced  that  his  daughter  Ach-  Kirjath_ 
sah  should  be  the  reward  of  the  successful  sepher’ 
assailant.  From  his  own  family  sprang  forth  the  cham¬ 
pion,  his  nephew  or  his  younger  brother  Othniel,  who 
won  the  ancient  fortress.  And  yet  again  from  the  same 
family  another  claim  was  put  forth.  Achsah,  worthy 
of  her  father  and  her  husband,  demands  some  better 
heritage  than  the  dry  and  thirsty  frontier  of  the  desert. 
Underneath  the  hill  on  which  Debir  stood  is  a  deep 
valley,  rich  with  verdure,  from  a  copious  rivulet,  which, 
rising  at  the  crest  of  the  glen,  falls,  with  a  continuity 
unusual  in  the  Judsean  hills,  down  to  its  lowest  depth. 
On  the  possession  of  these  upper  and  lower  a  bub- 
blings,”  so  contiguous  to  her  lover’s  prize,  Achsah  had 
set  her  heart.  The  shyness  of  the  bridegroom  to  ask, 
the  eagerness  of  the  bride  to  have,  are  both  put  be¬ 
fore  us.  She  comes  to  Othniel’s  house,  seated  on  her 
ass,  led  by  her  father.  She  will  not  enter.  According 
to  our  Version,  she  gently  descends  from  her  ass:  ac¬ 
cording  to  the  Septuagint,  she  screams,  or  she  murmurs, 
from  her  seat.  Her  father  asks  the  cause,  and  then 
she  demands  and  wins  “  the  blessing  ”  of  the  green 
valley  ;  the  gushing  stream  from  top  to  bottom, 
which  made  the  dry  and  barren  hill  above  a  rich 
possession.2 


1  Like  Byblos  afterwards.  See  Ew- 
ald,  i.  286. 

2  Josh.  xv.  18;  Judg.  i.  14.  In  the 
former  passage,  the  LXX.  makes  Ach- 
sah  (as  in  the  E.  V.)  the  moving 
cause  ;  in  the  latter,  Othniel.  In 
both,  Achsah  is  represented,  not  as 
<l  lighting  off,”  but  as  “  shoutino-  ”  or 

murmuring  ”  “  from  the  ass.”  The 
scene  of  this  incident  was  first  dis¬ 


covered  by  Dr.  Rosen,  ( Zeitschri/t  D. 
M.  G.  1857,  p.  50-64,)  and  under  his 
guidance  I  saw  it  in  1862.  The  word 
gulloth  translated  “  springs,”  but  more 
properly  “  waves  ”  or  “  bubblings,” 
well  applies  to  this  beautiful  rivulet. 
The  spots  are  now  called  Ain-Nunkur 
and  Dewir-Ban ,  about  one  hour  S.W. 
of  Hebron. 


294 


SETTLEMENT  OF  THE  TRIBES. 


Lect.  XII. 


On  one  more  enterprise  the  active  spirit  of  Judah 
entered.  This  time  we  see  it  not  in  any  individual 
but  personified  in  the  name  of  the  two  ancestors  of 
the  kindred  tribes  Judah  and  Simeon.  Whoever  may 
have  been  the  chiefs  of  the  tribes  thus  intended,  they 
aimed  at  yet  one  greater  prize  than  all  besides,  and  had 
almost  won  the  glory  which  was  reserved  for  their  de¬ 
scendant  centuries  afterwards.  Jerusalem,  as  it  wrould 
seem  for  a  time,  but  only  for  a  time,  fell  into  the  hands 
of  the  warrior  tribe.  When  next  it  appears,  it  is  still 
in  possession  of  the  old  inhabitants.  We  must  not  an¬ 
ticipate  the  future.  It  is  enough  to  have  seen  the 
series  of  simple  and  romantic  incidents  which  gave  to 
Judah  the  desert  frontier,  the  southern  fastnesses,  and 
the  choice  vineyards,  which  play  so  large  a  part  in 
the  History  of  the  Jewish,  in  the  imagery  of  the 
Christian  Church,  hereafter. 

2.  The  second,  or  more  regular  mode  of  assign- 
Assigna-  ment,  which,  as  has  been  well  observed,1  places 
tribes.  the  conquest  of  Palestine,  even  in  that  re¬ 
mote  and  barbarous  age,  in  favorable  contrast  with 


the  arbitrary  caprice  by  which  the  lands  of  England 
were  granted  away  to  the  Norman  chiefs,  was  inau¬ 
gurated,  so  to  speak,  by  Joshua’s  quaint  but  decisive 
Ephraim,  answer  to  his  own  tribe  of  Ephraim,  when 
they  claimed  more  than  their  due.  The  apportion¬ 
ment  of  this  great  tribe  was,  in  fact,  a  union  of  the 
two  principles.  One  lot,  and  one  only,  they  were  to 
have ;  the  rest  they  were  to  carve  out  for  themselves 
from  the  hills  and  forests  of  their  Canaanite  enemies. 
“  Why  hast  thou  given  me  but  one  lot  and  one  por- 
“  tion  to  inherit,  seeing  I  am  a  great  people,  foras- 
“  much  as  the  Lord  hath  blessed  me  hitherto  ?  ” 


1  Arnold’s  Hist,  of  Rome ,  i.  266. 


Lect.  XII. 


BENJAMIN. 


295 


Their  public-spirited  leader  replied:  —  “If  thou  be  a 
“  great  people,  get  thee  up  to  the  wood  country,  and 
“  cut  down  for  thyself  there.  The  mountain  shall  be 
a  thine,  for  it  is  a  wood,  and  thou  shalt  cut  it  down ; 
“  and  the  outgoings  shall  be  thine ;  for  thou  shalt 
“  drive  out  the  Canaanites,  for  they  have  iron  chariots, 
“  and  ‘  for  ’  they  are  strong.” 1  The  wild  bull  or  buf¬ 
falo  of  the  house  of  Joseph2  was  to  guard  the  north, 
as  the  lion  of  Judah  was  to  guard  the  south.3  One 
half  of  the  tribe  of  Manasseh,  as  we  have  already 
seen,  had  that  post  on  the  east  of  the  Jordan ;  the 
other  half,  with  Ephraim,  had  the  same  on  the  west. 

The  two  great  tribes  being  thus  provided,  the  re¬ 
maining  seven  had  their  property  assigned  according 
to  the  strictest  rule  of  the  ancient  “  assignation.” 

The  warlike  little  band  of  Benjamites,  which  had 
marched  in  the  desert  side  by  side  with  the  Benjamin 
mighty  sons  of  Joseph,  was  not  parted  from  them  in 
the  new  settlement.  It  hung  on  the  outskirts  of 
Ephraim.  Thus  a  group  was  formed  in  the  centre  of 
Palestine,  firmly  compacted  of  the  descendants  of  Rachel, 
cut  off  on  the  north  by  the  broad  plain  of  Esdraelon, 
and  on  the  south  by  the  precipitous  ravine  of  Hin- 
nom.  Hemmed  in  as  it  was  between  the  two  power¬ 
ful  neighbors  of  Ephraim  and  Judah,  the  tribe  of 
Benjamin,  nevertheless,  retained  a  character  of  its 
own,  eminently  indomitable  and  insubordinate.  The 
wolf  which  nursed  the  founders  of  Rome  was  not 
more  evidently  repeated  in  the  martial  qualities  of 
the  people  of  Romulus,  than  the  wolf,  to  which  Ben¬ 
jamin  is  compared  in  his  father’s  blessing,  appears 
in  the  eager,  restless  character  of  his  descendants. 

1  Josh.  xvii.  14-18;  Ewald,  ii.  315.  3  Josh,  xviii.  5. 

2  Deut.  xxxiii.  17. 


296 


SETTLEMENT  OF  THE  TRIBES. 


Lect.  XII. 


a  After  thee,  0  Benjamin/’1  was  its  well-known  war- 
cry.  It  furnished  the  artillery  (so  to  speak)  of  the 
Israelite  army,  by  its  archers  and  slingers.2  For  a 
short  time  it  rose  to  the  highest  rank  in  the  com¬ 
monwealth,  when  it  gave  birth  to  the  first  king.  Its 
ultimate  position  in  the  nation  was  altered  by  the 
one  great  change  which  affected  the  polarity  of  the 
whole  political  and  geographical  organization  of  the 
country,  but  of  none  more  than  that  of  Benjamin, 
when  the  fortress  of  Jebus,  hitherto  within  its  terri¬ 
tory,  was  annexed  by  Judah,  and  became  the  capital 
of  the  monarchy. 

In  the  wild  aspect  which  Simeon  henceforward  as- 
simeon.  sumes  on  the  edge  of  the  southern  desert,  we 
trace  the  perpetuation  of  the  fierce  temper  which  had 
drawn  down  the  curse  of  Jacob.  It  has  been  ingen¬ 
iously  conjectured  that  the  first  blow  which  broke  the 
numbers  and  the  spirit  of  the  tribe  was  the  pestilence 
that  visited  the  camp  after  the  Midianite  orgies,  and 
which  would  naturally  have  fallen  with  peculiar  force 
on  Simeon,  the  tribe  of  the  chief  offender ; 3  and  that 
this  accounts  for  its  total  omission,  at  least  in  one 
version  of  the  blessing  of  Moses.  But  this  is  hardly 
needed.  Simeon  is  the  exact  counterpart  of  Keuben. 
With  Beuben  he  marched  through  the  desert :  with 
Reuben  he  is  joined  in  another  version  of  the  Mosaic 
benediction.4  As  Reuben  in  the  east,  so  Simeon  in 
the  west,  blends  his  fortunes  with  those  of  the  Arab 
hordes  on  the  frontier,  and  dwindles  away  accord- 


1  Judg.  v.  14 ;  Hosea  y.  8. 

2  Judg.  xxi. 

3  Blunt’s  Undesigned  Coincidences , 

93-98,  founded  on  a  comparison  of 
Num.  i.  23 ;  xxiv.  1,  14  ;  xxv.  11. 


4  In  Deut.  xxxiii.  6.  In  the  Alex¬ 
andrian  MS.  the  reading  is,  “  Let 
“  Reuben  live  and  not  die,  and  let 
“  Simeon  be  many  in  number.” 


Lect.  XII. 


THE  NORTHERN  TRIBES. 


297 


ingly,1  and  only  reappears  in  the  dubious,  but  charac¬ 
teristic,  exploits  of  bis  descendant  Judith.2 

The  four  tribes  of  Zebulun,  Issachar,  Asher,  and 
Naphtali,  obtain  contiguous  portions  in  the  Zebulun 
north  of  Palestine,  as  they  were  allied  in  Jshe^and 
birth,  and  as  they  marched  through  the  desert.  Naphtah- 
They  formed,  as  it  were,  a  state  by  themselves.  A 
common  sanctuary  seems  to  have  been  intended  for 
them  in  Mount  Tabor.  The  forests  of  Lebanon,  the 
fertility  of  the  plain  of  Esdraelon,  the  port  of  Accho, 
even  the  glassy  deposit  of  the  little  stream  of  Belus, 
figure  in  the  blessings  pronounced  upon  them.3  But, 
with  the  exception  of  the  transient  splendor  of  the 
days  of  Barak  and  of  Gideon,  they  hardly  affect  the 
general  fortunes  of  the  nation.  It  is  not  till  the  Jew¬ 
ish  is  on  the  point  of  breaking  into  the  Christian 
Church,  that  these  northern  tribes  acquire  a  new  in¬ 
terest.  “  Galilee,”  then,  by  the  very  reason  of  its  pre¬ 
vious  isolation,  springs  into  overwhelming  importance. 
“  The  land  of  Zebulun.  the  land  of  Naphtali,  by  the 
“  way  of  the  sea,  beyond  Jordan,  Galilee  of  the  Gen- 
“  tiles ;  the  people  which  sat  in  darkness  saw  great 
“  light,  and  to  those  who  sat  in  the  region  and  shadow 
“  of  death  light  is  sprung  up.” 4 

The  last  of  the  tribes  that  received  its  due  was 
Dan,  the  smallest  of  all,  —  at  times  overlooked,  Dan. 

—  and  in  the  last  catalogue  of  the  tribes  that  appears 
in  the  Sacred  volume,5  dropped  out  altogether.  It 
was,  as  it  were,  squeezed  into  the  narrow  strip  be¬ 
tween  the  mountains  and  the  sea,  in  the  plain  already 

1  1  Chron.  iv.  39-43.  2  Judith  ix.  2. 

3  Gen.  xlix.  14;  Deut.  xxxiii.  18;  4  Isa.  ix. ;  Matt.  iv.  15,  16. 

see  Sinai  and  Palestine ,  348  ;  Ewald,  5  Rev.  vii.  4-8. 
ii.  379,  &c. 


38 


298 


SETTLEMENT  OF  THE  TRIBES. 


Lect.  XII. 


occupied  by  the  expelled  races,1  as  if  in  the  only  spot 
that  was  left  for  them.  Its  energies  were  great  be¬ 
yond  its  numbers ;  and  hence,  as  we  shall  see  in  the 
next  generation,  it  broke  out  from  its  narrow  terri¬ 
tory  and  won  a  seat  in  the  distant  north,2  on  the  con¬ 
fines  of  Naphtali,3  with  which  it  appears  blended  in  the 
later  history.  There  was,  indeed,  an  outlet  for  its 
powers  on  the  west ;  for  it  held  the  port  of  Jaffa,  and 
thither  retired  “  to  abide  in  its  ships,” 4  when  the  sur¬ 
rounding  territory  was  too  hot  to  hold  it.  But  it  is 
characteristic  of  the  essentially  inland  tendencies  of 
the  Israelite  nation,  that  this  possession  never  raised 
the  tribe  to  any  eminence.  The  privilege  of  Dan 
was,  that  he  was  to  lie  in  wait  for  the  invader  from 
the  south  or  from  the  north.  “A  serpent,”5  an  in¬ 
digenous,  home-born  “  adder,”  to  “  bite  the  heels  ”  of 
the  invading  stranger’s  horse ;  a  “  lion’s  whelp,” 6  small 
and  fierce,  “  to  leap  from  the  heights  of  Bashan,”  on 
the  armies  of  Damascus,  or  Nineveh.  “For  thy  sal- 
“  vation,  0  Lord,  have  I  waited,”  7  seems  to  have  been 
his  war-cry,  as  if  of  a  warrior  in  the  constant  atti¬ 
tude  of  expectation.  Once,  only,  in  the  history  of 
the  tribe,  so  far  as  we  know,  was  this  expectation 
fully  realized,  —  in  the  life  of  Samson. 

Levi,  alone,  had  no  regular  portion.  Its  original 
Levi.  character  of  a  tribe  without  a  fixed  home,  was 
preserved.  It  remained,  as  we  have  seen,  a  monument 
of  the  early  age  of  the  desert,  in  which  its  consecra¬ 
tion  originated.  Four  cities  were  allotted  to  it  in  each 
tribe,  if  possible  (with  the  exception  of  the  great  cen- 

1  Judg.  i.  34.  4  Judg.  v.  17. 

2  Judg.  xviii. ;  see  Lecture  XIII.  5  Gen.  xlix.  1 7. 

3  See  Blunt’s  Undesigned  Coinci-  6  Deut.  xxxiii.  22. 

dences,  119.  7  Gen.  xlix.  18. 


Lect.  XII. 


LEVI. 


299 


tral  sanctuaries  of  Shiloh  and  Bethel)  the  holy  places 
of  earlier  times.  The  lands  round  those  cities,1  how¬ 
ever,  were  not  fields  for  agriculture,  but  pastures  for 
cattle.  The  old  life  was,  in  their  case,  never  entirely 
to  subside  into  the  new.  They  were  still  to  keep  up, 
—  in  their  dress,  in  their  separation,  in  their  sacrificial 
ministrations,  in  their  pastoral  employments,  in  their 
wild,  barbarian  habits,  an  image  of  the  past.  In  the 
curses  of  Jacob  there  is  no  distinction  drawn  between 
them  and  the  nomadic  Simeon.  “  Cursed  be  their  an- 
“  ger,  for  it  was  fierce,  and  their  wrath,  for  it  was  cruel. 
“  I  will  divide  them  in  Jacob  and  scatter  them  in  Is- 
“  rael.” 2  The  uncompromising  zeal,  which  had  first  pro¬ 
cured  their  consecration  in  the  wilderness,  and  which 
ultimately  insured  their  perpetuity,  even  beyond  that 
of  any  other  of  the  tribes,  is  just  visible  here  and  there 
in  that  early  period.  “  They  shall  teach  Jacob  Thy 
“  judgments,  and  Israel  Thy  law.  They  shall  put  in- 
“  cense  before  Thee,  and  whole  burnt  sacrifice  upon 
“  Thine  altar.  Bless,  Lord,  his  substance,  and  accept 
“  the  work  of  his  hands.  Smite  through  the  loins  of 
“  them  that  rise  against  him,  and  of  them  that  hate 
“him,  that  they  rise  not  again.” 3  So  the  brighter 
side  is  brought  out  in  the  blessing  of  Moses ;  but  its 
realization  must  be  reserved  for  the  change  of  their 
position  in  the  altered  state  of  the  Jewish  Church  and 
nation  under  the  monarchy. 

III.  With  the  conquest  of  Canaan  and  the  settle¬ 
ment  of  the  tribes,  Jewish  history  entered  on  Effects  of 

J  the  con- 

a  new  phase.  quest. 

1.  The  Conquest  was  the  final  settlement  of  the 
Chosen  People  as  a  nation.  It  was  the  en-  settlement 

_  •  j  _  _  tt  __  •  //  rv  r\  _  of  the 


300 


EFFECTS  OF  THE  CONQUEST. 


lect.  xn. 


lobte  Land/’  —  the  oasis  of  that  portion  of  Asia.  From 
a  wandering  Arabian  tribe,  they  were  now  turned 
into  a  civilized,  and,  in  a  considerable  degree,  an  ag¬ 
ricultural  commonwealth.  The  feeling  of  repose,  of 
enjoyment,  of  thankfulness,  which  breathes  through 
the  104th  and  105th  Psalms,  now  first  became  possi¬ 
ble.  The  festivals  of  the  harvest  and  the  vintage,  in 
the  Feast  of  Weeks,  and  (to  a  large  extent)  in  the 
Feast  of  Tabernacles,  were  commemorations  of  this 
consciousness  of  permanent  possession.  “  Begin  to 
“  number  the  seven  weeks  from  such  time  as  thou 
“  beginnest  to  put  the  sickle  to  the  corn. 

“  Thou  shalt  observe  the  Feast  of  Tabernacles  seven 
“  days,  after  that  thou  hast  gathered  in  thy  corn  and 
“  thy  wine  :  and  thou  shalt  rejoice  in  thy  feast,  thou, 
“  and  thy  son,  and  thy  daughter,  and  thy  man-servant, 
“  and  thy  maid-servant,  and  the  Levite,  the  stranger, 
“  and  the  fatherless,  and  the  widow,  that  are  within 
“  thy  gates  ...  in  the  place  which  the  Lord  shall 
“  choose :  because  the  Lord  thy  God  shall  bless  thee 
tt  in  all  thine  increase,  and  in  all  the  works  of  thine 
“  hands,  therefore  thou  shalt  surely  rejoice.” 1  The 
name  of  one  of  these  feasts,  “  Pentecost,”  has  passed 
into  our  Whitsuntide ; 2  the  spirit  of  the  other,  in  many 
respects,  corresponds  to  our  Christmas ;  and  even  the 
spiritual  signification  of  both  the  Christian  festivals 
might  gain  from  a  recollection  of  the  actual  enjoy¬ 
ment  which  marked,  and  which  still  marks,  those  an¬ 
cient  Israelite  solemnities.  When  the  modern  Jew,  in 
whatever  part  of  the  world  he  may  be,  puts  together 
the  branches  in  the  court  of  his  house,  and  with  his 

1  Deut.  xvi.  9,  13-15.  vice  for  Pentecost  (Form  of  prayer 

2  The  68th  Psalm,  used  in  the  ser-  according  to  the  custom  of  the  Span- 
vices  of  the  Christian  Church  for  ish  and  Portuguese  Jews). 
Whitsunday,  forms  the  Jewish  ser- 


Lect.  XII. 


THE  HOLY  LAND. 


301 


whole  family  partakes  of  his  meal  underneath  their 
shade,  it  is  a  literal  perpetuation  of  the  gayety  of 
heart  with  which  his  ancestors  sat  down,  each  under 
his  fig-tree  and  his  vine,  in  their  newly-acquired  homes, 
—  an  ever-recurring  anniversary  of  the  triumph  of  the 
Conquest. 

“  And  when  their  wondrous  march  was  o’er, 

And  they  had  won  their  homes, 

Where  Abraham  fed  his  flocks  of  yore 
Among  their  fathers’  tombs : 

A  land  that  drinks  the  rain  of  heav’n  at  will, 

Where  waters  kiss  the  feet  of  many  a  vine-clad  hill. 

“  Oft  as  they  watch’d  at  thoughtful  eve 
A  gale  from  bowers  of  balm 
Sweep  o’er  the  billowy  corn,  and  heave 
The  tresses  of  the  palm ; 

It  was  a  fearful  joy,  I  ween, 

To  trace  the  heathen’s  toil, 

The  limpid  wells,  the  orchard  green, 

Left  ready  for  the  spoil.”  1 

2.  It  was,  further,  the  occupation  of  a  country  hith¬ 
erto  inhabited,  and  still  to  a  great  degree,  by  contact 
an  alien  race.  The  contest  was  severe,  and  its  cTnaan- 
traces  still  remained.  The  whole  subsequent ltes* 
history,  down  to  the  Captivity,  was  colored  by  the  wars, 
by  the  customs,  by  the  contagion,  of  Phoenician  and 
Canaanite  rites,  to  which,  for  good  or  evil,  they  were 
henceforth  exposed.  It  was  truly,  though  on  a  smaller 
scale,  like  the  entrance  of  the  Christian  Church  on  the 
inheritance  of  the  pagan  classical  world,  at  the  con¬ 
version  of  the  Roman  empire,  at  the  revival  of  letters, 
and,  it  may  he,  on  the  possession  of  still  wider  treas¬ 
ures  hereafter. 


1  Keble’s  Christian  Year ,  3d  S.  of  expression  ;  but  the  general  feeling 
after  Trinity.  I  have  omitted  a  few  is  as  true  to  geography  as  it  is  to  his- 
lines  which  contain  a  slight  inaccuracy  tory. 


302 


EFFECTS  OF  THE  CONQUEST. 


Lect.  XII. 


3.  It  was  the  occupation  of  a  the  Holy  Land/’  —  the 
Occupation  land  set  apart  for  the  “  Holy  People.”  I  have 
Land?Holy  described  elsewhere  what  may  be  called  the 
geographical  evidence  for  the  Providence  which  guided 
the  steps  of  Israel.1  By  its  absolutely  unique  confor 
mation, — by  the  unparalleled  peculiarity  of  the  Jordan 
valley,  —  by  its  seclusion,  through  sea,  and  land,  and 
desert,  and  river,  from  the  surrounding  world,  —  the 
country  has  a  mark  set  upon  it,  corresponding  to  those 
features  which  have  caused  the  Jews  to  “  dwell  alone  ” 
among  the  nations.  And  yet  also  its  central  situation 
between  Assyria  and  Egypt,  and  its  opening  to  the 
Mediterranean,  gave  it  the  power  of  at  last  bursting 
its  bonds.  Its  smallness  and  narrowness  gave  it  the 
compactness,  and,  at  the  same  time,  the  outward  in¬ 
significance,  which,  as  in  the  case  of  Greece,  so  highly 
enhances  the  moral  grandeur  of  the  Church  and  State 
that  rose  within  its  boundaries.  And,  within  these 
bounds,  the  variety  and  diversity  of  features,  —  sea, 
mountain,  plains,  desert,  tropical  vegetation,  springs, 
earthquakes,  perhaps  volcanoes,  sharp  divisions  between 
one  state  and  another,  —  made  it  the  fit  receptacle  of 
a  nation  which  was  to  give  birth  to  the  Sacred  book 
of  all  lands ;  which  was  to  be  the  parent  and  likeness 
of  a  Church  whose  name  was  to  be  “  Catholic,”  and 
whose  chief  distinction  was  to  be  its  variety  of  gifts 
and  diversity  of  character. 

4.  From  this  time,  also,  for  the  Israelite  common- 
Lawsof  wealth,  sprang  up  by  degrees  that  state  ot 
property.  socfoty  for  which,  as  has  been  often  observed, 
the  country  was  so  well  suited,  and  which,  in  time, 
so  well  favored  the  growth  of  individual  liberty,  of 
national  independence,  and  of  general  purity  of  do- 

1  Sinai  and  Palestine ,  ch.  ii. 


Lect.  XII. 


LAWS  OF  PROPERTY. 


303 


mestic  life.  To  Joshua,  a  fixed  Jewish  tradition  as¬ 
cribed  ten  decrees,1  laying  down  precise  rules,  Decrees  of 
which  were  instituted  to  protect  the  prop- Joshua- 
erty  of  each  tribe,  and  of  each  householder,  from  law¬ 
less  depredation.  Cattle,  of  a  smaller  kind,  were  to 
be  allowed  to  graze  in  thick  woods,  not  in  thin 
woods  ;  in  woods,  no  kind  of  cattle,  without  the  own¬ 
er’s  consent.  Sticks  and  branches  might  be  gathered 
by  any  Hebrew,  but  not  cut.  Herbs,  of  any  kind, 
might  be  gathered,  with  the  exception  of  pease. 
Woods  might  be  pruned,  provided  that  they  were 
not  olives  or  fruit-trees,  and  that  there  was  sufficient 
shade  in  the  place.  Each  district  or  town  was  to 
have  its  river  and  its  spring  for  its  own  use.  Fish 
might  be  caught  in  the  Lake  of  Gennesaret  with 
hooks,  but  nets  or  fishing-boats  were  only  to  be  used 
by  the  members  of  those  tribes  who  lived  on  its 
shores.  The  roads  were  to  be  kept  free  from  public 
nuisance.  Any  one  lost  in  a  vineyard  might  proceed 
in  it  without  trespass,  till  he  reached  his  home.  If 
the  roads  became  impassable  they  might  be  left  for 
by-paths.  A  dead  body  might  be  buried  wherever 
found,  provided  that  it  were  not  near  or  in  a  town. 

These  rules,  whatever  may  be  their  date,  both  show 
the  traditional  estimate  of  Joshua,  as  the  Jewish 

house- 

founder  of  the  common  law  of  property  m  holders. 
Palestine,  and  also  the  general  framework  of  society 
at  least  in  some  early  period  of  the  history.  The 
glimpses  into  the  private  life  of  the  Jewish  house¬ 
holders  are  naturally  so  few  that  we  can  hardly  form 
any  conclusion  as  to  the  extent  to  which  the  inten¬ 
tions  of  the  Mosaic  law  and  of  the  settlements  of 
Joshua  were  carried  out.  Some  instances,  however, 

1  Selden,  De  Jure  Naturali ,  book  vi. ;  Fabricius,  Cod.  Pseudep.  V.  T.  i.  874. 


304 


REMAINS  OF  THE  CONQUERED  RACES.  Lect.  XH. 


remain  to  us  in  later  times,  which,  bearing  as  they 
do  on  their  face  every  appearance  of  long-inherited 
usage,  may  he  fairly  taken  as  samples  of  the  rest. 
Boaz,1  the  owner  of  the  cornfields  of  Bethlehem,  in 
the  midst  of  his  reapers  and  gleaners;  Nabal,2  the 
rich  shepherd  on  the  slopes  of  the  southern  Carmel ; 
Barzillai,3  the  powerful  chief  beyond  the  Jordan,  with 
his  patriarchal  possessions  of  sheep  and  cattle ;  Na¬ 
both,4  the  independent  owner  of  the  vineyard  on  the 
hill  of  Jezreel, —  all  in  their  different  forms,  present 
the  same  picture  of  the  established  usages  in  indi¬ 
vidual  and  family  life;  and  the  reluctance  even  of 
kings  to  break  through  these  usages,  and  the  vehe¬ 
mence  with  which  the  Prophets  denounce  any  such 
attempt  on  the  part  either  of  kings  or  of  nobles, 
showed  the  firm  hold  that  the  traditions  of  the  Con¬ 
quest  kept  on  the  national  mind. 

IV.  The  survey  of  this  great  event  would  not  be 
Remains  of  complete  without  a  last  glance  at  the  fate 
quered"  °f  conquered  inhabitants.  The  disturbed 
races*  state  of  the  whole  subsequent  period,  reserved 
for  the  next  Lecture,  shows  how  far  less  sweeping 
than  at  first  would  appear  was  the  extirpation  of  the 
vanquished  race.  It  will  be  sufficient  here  briefly  to 
indicate  the  traces  of  them  which  were  permanently 
left  in  the  country. 

The  usual  relation  of  the  conquering  and  the  con¬ 
quered  occupants  was,  as  a  general  rule,  reversed. 
We  find  the  old  inhabitants  taking  refuge  not  in 
the  mountains  but  in  the  plains :  the  invaders  re¬ 
pelled  from  the  plains,  but  victorious  in  the  moun¬ 
tains.  This,  we  are  expressly  told,5  arose  from  the 


1  Ruth  ii.  4. 

2  1  Sam.  xxv.  2. 

3  2  Sam.  xvii.  28. 


4  1  Kings  xxi.  1-3. 

5  Judg.  i.  19. 


Lect.  XII.  REMAINS  OF  THE  CONQUERED  RACES.  305 

respective  forces  of  the  combatants.  The  strength  of 
the  Canaanites  was  in  their  chariots  and  horses;  of 
the  Israelites,  in  their  invincible  infantry.  In  one  in¬ 
stance  only,  the  battle  of  Merom,  the  victory  was 
won  on  level  ground  against  the  formidable  array  of 
Jabin’s  cavalry.  Another  resource  in  the  hands  of 
the  old  inhabitants  was  the  strength  of  their  for¬ 
tresses.  “The  cities,  great  and  fenced  up  to  heav¬ 
en,”  1  had  always  been  a  subject  of  alarm  to  their 
less  civilized  invaders ;  and,  though  in  the  first  onset 
some  had  fallen,  yet,  after  the  fervor  of  the  Conquest 
was  passed  away,  the  native  inhabitants,  especially 
when  on  the  edge  or  in  the  midst  of  the  friendly 
plains,  recovered  spirit,  and  maintained  their  ground 
for  generations,  if  not  centuries,  after  the  time  of 
Joshua. 

Amongst  these  the  five  cities  of  Philistia,2  although 
three  of  them  (Gaza,  Askelon,  and  Ekron)  Philistine 
were  for  a  short  time  in  the  hands  of  the  fortresses- 
Israelites,  resisted  the  attempts  of  Judah.  The  abo¬ 
riginal  Avites  also  lingered  beside  them.  Je-  Jebus. 
bus,  the  only  instance  of  a  completely  mountain  fast¬ 
ness  which  remained  untaken,  was  conspicuous  for  its 
defiance  of  the  same  great  tribe,  defended  by  the 
steep  natural  trench  of  its  deep  valleys. 

Along  the  sea-coast  were  all  the  Phoenician  cities 
from  Dor  and  Accho  as  far  as  Zidon,3  not  The  sea_ 
to  speak  of  Arvad  in  the  farther  north.  <  In  coast‘ 
the  plain  between  Beth-horon  and  the  sea  was  the 
little  kingdom  of  Gezer,  which  remained  indepen¬ 
dent  till  it  was  conquered  by  the  king  of  Egypt,  and 
given  as  a  dowry  to  Solomon’s  queen.4 

1  Deut.  i.  28. 

2  Josh.  xiii.  2 ;  Judg.  i.  21. 

39 


3  Judg.  i.  31. 

4  1  Kings  ix.  16 ;  Judg.  i.  29. 


306 


REMAINS  OF  THE  CONQUERED  RACES.  Lect.  XII. 


In  the  north  the  strong  towns  along  the  plain  of 

Fortresses  in  ^s^rael°n  held  out  against  even  the  vigor  of 
Esdraeion.  j^anaSge]^i  though  expressly  charged  with  the 

duty  of  expelling  them,  which  properly  belonged  to 
the  less  warlike  tribes  of  Issachar  and  Asher.  These 
were  Taanach  and  Megiddo,  the  future  encampments 
of  Sisera’s  army ;  Endor,  hence  naturally  the  abode 
of  the  witch  whom  Saul  consulted ;  Ibleam  in  the 
same  region;  Bethshan,  with  its  temple  of  Astarte, 
the  Jebus  of  the  north,  which  remained,  under  the 
name  of  Scythopolis,  a  heathen  and  Gentile  city,  even 
to  the  Christian  era. 

On  the  northern  frontier,  four  remnants  of  the  an¬ 
cient  inhabitants  survived  both  the  shock  of  the  in¬ 
vasion  of  Machir,  and  also  of  the  battle  of  Merom. 
At  the  source  of  the  Jordan  was  the  Phoenician 
colony  of  Laish.1 2  Beyond  this  was  the  fortress  of 
Maacah.  Its  situation  in  the  upland  plain,  above  the 
sources  of  the  Jordan,  and  thus  beyond  the  actual 
frontier  of  Palestine,  gave  it  a  natural  independence, 
which  was  still  further  sustained  by  the  oracular  rep¬ 
utation  of  the  wisdom  of  its  inhabitants.  It  was 
known  from  its  position  in  that  well-watered  plateau 
as  Abel-Beth-Maacah,  “the  Meadow  of  the  House  of 
Maacah.”3  On  the  east  of  the  same  plateau  was  the 
tribe  of  the  Geshurites,4  ruled  by  a  race  of  indepen¬ 
dent  kings.  Still  more  remote,  but  yet  within  con¬ 
tact  of  Israel,  was  the  Hivite  settlement  on  Lebanon 
and  round  the  sanctuary  of  Baalgad  on  the  sacred 
heights  of  Hermon.5 

These  (till  David’s  time)  were  independent.  Others 

1  Judg.  i.  27 ;  Josh.  xvli.  11-13.  4  Josh.  xiii.  11-13  ;  2  Sam.  xv.  8. 

2  See  Lecture  XIII.  5  Judg.  iii.  3. 

3  Josh.  xiii.  13  ;  2  Sam.  xx.  15. 


Lect.  XII.  REMAINS  OF  THE  CONQUERED  RACES. 


307 


remained  either  in  friendly  relations  or  tributary. 
Amongst  the  friendly  tribes  may  be  reckoned  Tributary 
the  Kenites,  or  Arabian  kinsmen  of  Jethro, tnbes' 
in  the  south  and  north;  the  Gibeonites,  with  the 
towns  in  their  league ;  the  second  Luz,  founded  by 
the  secret  ally  who  had  betrayed  the  first;  and  a 
remnant  of  Hittites  in  or  near  Shechem.  Amongst 
the  tributaries  were  the  four  comparatively  obscure 
towns  of  Kitron,  Nahalol,  Bethshemesh,  and  Betha- 
nath;1  and  the  general  population  who  appear  in  that 
capacity  in  the  reign  of  Solomon.2 

Less  conspicuous  vestiges  of  the  Canaanite  race  may 
be  found  in  the  names  of  towns,  struggling  for  exist¬ 
ence  with  the  new  names  imposed  by  the  conquerors, 

—  Kirjath-arba  with  Hebron,  Kirjath-sepher  with  Debir, 
Kenath  with  Nobah,  Luz  with  Bethel,  Ephratah  with 
Bethlehem ;  and  yet  again,  in  a  more  striking  form, 
in  the  few  individuals  who,  from  time  to  time,  ap¬ 
pear  in  the  service  or  alliance  of  the  Israelite  kings, 

—  Uriah  the  Hittite,  Ittai  of  Gath,  Araunah  the  Je- 
busite. 

That  any  escaped  by  migration,  is  never  expressly 
said,  but  is  so  probable,  that  we  may  well  Migration, 
accept  even  very  slight  confirmations  of  it  from  other 
sources.  Two  traditions  are  preserved  to  this  effect. 
When  Procopius  was  in  Africa,  in  the  army  of  Beli- 
sarius,  two  pillars  of  white  marble  were  pointed  out 
to  him  near  Tangier,  bearing  an  inscription  in  Phoe¬ 
nician  characters,  which  was  thus  explained  to  him : 
‘  We  are  they  that  fled  from  before  the  face  of  the 
“ robber  Joshua,  the  son  of  Nun.”3  The  genuineness, 

1  Judg.  i.  30,  33.  and  Moses  Cliorenensis  (i.  18).  The 

2  1  Kings  ix.  20,  21.  arguments  against  the  genuineness  of 

3  Procopius  {Bell.  Vand.  ii.  10)  this  inscription  by  Kenrick  {Phcenicia^ 
supported  by  Suidas  (in  voce  Canaan )  p.  67),  and  Ewald  (ii.  298),  are  very 


308  THE  CAPITALS.  Lect.  XII. 

or  even  the  antiquity,  of  the  monument  may  be  more 
than  doubtful ;  but  it  shows  the  belief  which  lingered 
amongst  the  remnant  of  the  Phoenician  colonies  on 
the  coast  of  Africa.  Another  story,  preserved  in  Rab¬ 
binical  legends,  represented  that  when  Alexander  ar¬ 
rived  in  Palestine,  the  Gergesenes,  or  Girgashites,  who 
had  fled  to  Africa,  came  to  plead  their  cause  before 
him  against  the  Israelites,  for  unlawful  dispossession.1 
Trivial  as  these  traditions  may  be  in  themselves,  they 
have  some  interest,  as  showing  the  last  lingering  rem¬ 
iniscences —  if  not  in  the  conquered,  at  least  in  the 
conquerors  —  of  the  old  race  which  they  had  cast  out 
and  superseded. 

Y.  One  final  effect  of  this  epoch  must  be  noticed, 
The  the  establishment  of  the  first  national  sanc- 
Capitais.  tuary,  and  the  first  national  capital  in  Pales¬ 
tine.  Bethel  —  which  by  its  sacred  name  and  asso¬ 
ciations  would  have  been  naturally  chosen  —  was,  at 
this  early  stage  of  the  Conquest,  still  in  the  hands 
Shiloh.  of  the  Canaanites.  Shiloh,  therefore,  became 
and  remained  the  seat  of  the  Ark  till  the  establish¬ 
ment  of  the  monarchy ;  and  thus  was,  as  long  as  it 
lasted,  a  memorial  of  the  peculiar  accidents  of  the 
Conquest  in  which  it  first  originated.  The  general 
appearance  of  the  sanctuary  and  its  ultimate  fate  be¬ 
long  to  the  ensuing  period  of  the  history.  But  the 
selection  of  the  site  belongs  to  this  period,  and  could 
belong  to  no  other.  The  place  of  the  sanctuary  was 
naturally  fixed  by  the  place  of  the  Ark.  This,  as 
we  have  seen,  was,  in  the  first  instance,  Gilgal.  But, 
as  the  conquerors  advanced  into  the  interior,  a  more 

strong.  But  there  is  no  reason  to  (See  Rawlinson’s  Bampton  Lectures , 

doubt  that  such  a  monument  was  p.  381.) 

seen  by  Procopius,  and  the  inscrip-  l  Otho,  Lex  Rabb.  25. 

tion  interpreted  to  him,  as  he  states. 


Lect.  XII. 


SHECHEM 


309 


central  situation  became  necessary.  This  was  found  in 
a  spot  unmarked  by  any  natural  features  of  strength 
or  beauty,  or  by  any  ancient  recollections;  recom¬ 
mended  only  by  its  comparative  seclusion,  near  the 
central  thoroughfare  of  Palestine,  yet  not  actually  upon 
it.  Its  ancient  Canaanite  name  seems  to  have  been 
Taanath.1  The  title  of  “  Shiloh  ”  was  probably  given 
to  it,  in  token  of  the  “rest”  which  the  weary  con¬ 
querors  found  in  its  quiet  valley. 

But  Shiloh  —  although  it  succeeded  to  Gilgal  as  the 
Holy  Place  of  the  Holy  Land,  and  although  from 
thence  was  made  the  survey  and  apportionment  of 
the  territory  —  was  intended  only  as  a  temporary 
halt.  It  was  still  not  the  city,  but  the  “  camp  of 
Shiloh.” 2  The  spot  which  the  conquerors  fixed  as 
the  capital  was  Shechem,  the  ancient  city  Shechem. 
before  which  Jacob  had  first  encamped,  and  now  the 
centre  of  the  great  tribe  of  Ephraim,  the  tribe  of 
Joshua  himself.  When  he  first  arrived  at  this  his 
future  home,  is  uncertain.  In  the  variations  of  the 
Hebrew  and  Septuagint  texts,3  we  may  be  allowed  to 
follow  the  guidance  of  Josephus,  and  connect  the 
celebration  of  this  marked  event  in  his  life  with  its 
closing  scenes,  which  unquestionably  took  place  in 
that  most  beautiful  of  all  the  sites  of  Western  Pales¬ 
tine.  In  that  central  valley  of  the  hills  of  Ephraim, 
which  commands  the  view  of  the  Jordan  valley  on  the 
east,  and  the  sea  on  the  west  —  a  complete  draught 
through  the  heart  of  the  country  —  was  the  fit  seat 
of  the  house  of  Joseph,  the  ancient  portion  of  their 
ancestor,  given  by  Jacob  himself.  Here  were  the  two 

1  Josh.  xvi.  6  ;  xviii.  1.  This  is  the  immediately  after  the  fall  of  Jericho ; 

view  of  Kurtz  (ii.  70).  in  the  LXX.  after  the  fall  of  Ai ;  in 

2  Judg.  xxi.  12.  Josephus  (Ant.  v.  1,  §§  19,  20),  at  the 

3  In  the  Received  Text  he  arrives  close  of  his  life. 


310 


THE  END  OF  JOSHUA. 


Lect.  XII. 


sacred  mountains,  Ebal  and  Gerizim,  marked  out  for 
the  curses  and  blessings  of  the  Law.  From  the  low¬ 
er  spurs  of  those  hills,  all  but  meeting  across  the  nar¬ 
rowest  part  of  the  valley,  those  curses  and  blessings 
were  first  chanted,  and  the  loud  Amen  from  the  vast 
multitudes  below  echoed  back  by  the  surrounding 
hills.  Ebal  stretching  along  the  northern  side  of  the 
valley  became,  as  its  many  rock-hewn  tombs  still  in¬ 
dicate,  the  necropolis  of  the  new  settlement.  Gerizim, 
the  oldest  sanctuary  in  Palestine,  reaching  back  even 
to  the  days  of  Abraham  and  Melchizedek,  became  the 
natural  shelter  of  the  capital.  From  its  steep  sides 
and  slopes  burst  forth  the  thirty-two  springs  which 
have  filled  the  valley  with  a  mass  of  living  verdure. 
Here  the  two  tribes  of  the  house  of  Joseph  depos¬ 
ited,  at  last,  the  sacred  burden  they  had  borne  with 
them  through  the  wilderness,  —  the  Egyptian  coffin 
containing  the  embalmed  body  of  Joseph  himself,  to 
be  buried  in  the  rich  cornfields  which  his  father  had 
given  to  the  favorite  son  of  his  favorite  Rachel.1 

This  was  “the  border  of  the  sanctuary,  the  moun¬ 
tain  which  the  right  hand  of  God  had  purchased,” 2 
for  the  tribe  which  now  through  its  victorious  leader 
stood  foremost  amongst  them  all,  and  which  hence¬ 
forth  retained  its  supremacy  till  it  fell,  in  the  fall, 
though  but  for  a  time,  of  the  nation  itself.3  How 
closely  the  grandeur  of  Ephraim  and  the  selection  of 
this  seat  of  their  power  are  connected  with  the  career 
Joshua.  of  Joshua,  may  be  seen  from  the  fact  that  he 
alone  of  all  the  Jewish  heroes  after  the  time  of  Moses, 
is  enshrined  in  the  traditions  of  the  Samaritan.  He 

1  For  Shechem  (now  Nablus),  see  and  the  Samaritans”  (in  Vacation 
Sinai  and  Palestine ,  ch.  v.,  Dr.  Rosen  Tourists ,  1861). 

( Zeitschrift  Deutsch.  Morg.  Gesell-  2  Ps.  Ixxviii.  54. 
schaft,  xiv.  634),  Mr.  Grove,  “  Nablus  3  Lecture  XVII. 


Lect.  XII. 


HIS  GRAVE. 


311 


is  a  King  Joshua  ” :  he  takes  up  his  abode  on  the 
“  Blessed  Mountain/’  as  Gerizim  is  always  called :  on 
its  summit  are  still  pointed  out  the  twelve  stones 
which  he  laid  in  order:  he  builds  a  citadel  on  the 
adjacent  site  of  Samaria :  he  confers  once  a  week 
with  the  high  priest  Eleazar:  he  leaves  his  power  to 
his  son  Phinehas,  and  in  this  confusion  the  His  fare_ 
history  of  Israel  abruptly  terminates.1  But welL 
the  connection  of  Joshua  with  Shechem  and  with 
Ephraim,  though  more  soberly,  is  not  less  clearly 
marked  in  the  Sacred  narrative.  He  appears  there  as 
the  representative  of  his  tribe;  yet,  as  we  have  seen, 
checking  that  overbearing  pride  which  at  last  caused 
their  ruin.  Beneath  the  old  consecrated  oak  of  Abra¬ 
ham  and  Jacob,2  of  which  the  memory  still  lingers  in 
a  secluded  corner  of  the  valley,  under  the  northeast¬ 
ern  flank  of  Gerizim,  he  made  his  farewell  address 
and  set  up  there  the  pillar  which  long  remained  as 
his  memorial.3  In  and  around  Shechem  arose  the 
first  national  burial-place,  a  counterpoise  to  the  patri¬ 
archal  sepulchres  at  Hebron.  Joseph’s  tomb  His  grave, 
was  already  fixed:  its  reputed  site  is  visible  to  this 
day.  A  tradition,  current  at  the  time  of  the  Chris¬ 
tian  era,4  ascribed  the  purchase  of  this  tomb  to  Abra¬ 
ham,  and  included  within  it  the  remains,  not  only  of 
Joseph,  but  of  the  twelve  Fathers  of  the  Jewish 
tribes,  and  of  Jacob  himself.  Eleazar5  was  buried  in 

1  Samaritan  Joshua ,  chaps.  24,  42.  The  Mussulmans  call  it  “  Rigad  el 

2  Josh.  xxiv.  26.  Amad ,”  “the  place  of  the  pillar ,” 

3  Ibid.  27  ;  Judg.  ix.  6,  37.  This  or  “  Sheykh-eZ- 4  wiad,”  “the  saint  of 
spot,  called  in  Gen.  xii.  6,  and  xxxv.  the  pillar 

4,  “Allon-Moreh,”  “theoakofMoreh”  4  Acts  vii.  15,  16. 

or  of  Shechem,  is  called  by  the  Sa-  5  Josh.  xxiv.  33.  His  tomb  is  still 
maritans  Ahron-Moreh,  “the  Ark  of  shown  in  a  charming  little  close  over- 
Moreh,”  from  a  supposition  that  in  a  shadowed  by  venerable  terebinths,  at 
vault  underneath  is  buried  the  Ark.  Awertah ,  a  few  miles  S.  E.  of  Nablfls. 


312 


THE  GRAVE  OF  JOSHUA. 


Lect.  XU. 


the  rocky  sides  of  a  hill  which  bore  the  name  of  his 
more  famous  son,  Phinehas,  who  was  himself,  doubt¬ 
less,  interred  in  the  same  sepulchre.  It  is  described 
as  being  in  the  mountains  of  Ephraim,  and  is  pointed 
out  by  Samaritan  tradition  on  a  height  immediately 
east  of  Gerizim.  The  grave  of  Joshua  has  been  by 
the  Mussulmans  claimed  for  a  far  distant  spot.  On  the 
summit  of  the  Giant’s  Hill,  overlooking  the  Bosphorus 
and  the  Black  Sea,  his  vast  tomb  is  shown,  with  the 
gigantic  proportions  in  which  Orientals  delight.  But 
the  reverence  of  his  own  countrymen  cherished  the 
remembrance  of  it  with  a  more  accurate  knowledge, 
in  the  inheritance  which  had  been  given  to  him  — 
as  though  he  were  a  sole  tribe  in  himself — in  Tim- 
nath-serah,  or  Heres,  “on  the  north  side  of  the  hill 
of  Gaash ;  ” 1  and  in  the  same  grave  (according  to  a 
very  ancient  tradition)  were  buried  the  stone  knives 
used  in  the  ceremony  of  circumcision  at  Gilgal,  which 
were  long  sought  out  as  relics  by  those  who  came 
in  after-years  to  visit  the  tomb  of  their  mighty  De¬ 
liverer.2 

l  Ibid.  xix.  44-50;  xxiv.  30.  A  2  Josh.  xxiv.  29  (LXX.).  The  spot 
Rabbinical  tradition  supposes  it  to  be  is  not  known  with  certainty,  but  is 
called  Heres ,  from  an  image  of  the  probably  in  the  hills  southwards  of 
sun  to  commemorate  the  battle  of  Shechme.  See  Ritter’s  Palestine ,  iii. 
Beth-horon.  But  it  is  probably  only  563,  564 
the  transposition  of  the  letters  of 
Serah. 


THE  JUDGES. 


- ♦— 

Xm.  ISRAEL  UNDER  THE  JUDGES. 
XIV.  DEBORAH. 

XY.  GIDEON. 

XVI.  JEPHTHAH  AND  SAMSON. 

XVII.  THE  FALL  OF  SHILOH. 


40 


SPECIAL  AUTHORITIES  FOR  THIS  PERIOD. 


1.  (a)  The  Book  of  Judges ;  the  Book  of  Ruth ;  1  Sam.  i.-vii. 

^Hebrew  and  LXX.).  (b)  Ps.  lxxviii.  56-66;  lxxxiii.  9-12; 
Isa.  ix.  4;  x.  26;  xxviii.  21;  Jer.  vii.  12;  xxvi.  6;  Ecclus. 
xlvi.  11-20;  Heb.  xi.  32-34. 

2.  The  Jewish  Traditions  preserved  in  Josephus  (Ant.  v.  2-vi.  1), 

and  the  Jewish  Chronicle  Seder  Olam  (c.  11,  12,  13). 

3.  The  Heathen  Traditions  (Sanchoniathon  ?  in  Eus.  Prcep.  Ev.  i.  9). 


THE  JUDGES. 


LECTURE  XIII. 

ISRAEL  UNDER  THE  JUDGES. 

We  are  now  arrived  at  the  last  stage  of  the  first  period 
of  the  history  of  the  Chosen  People.  We  have  Character- 
seen  the  nation  of  slaves  turned  into  a  nation  of  period, 
freemen  in  the  deliverance  from  Egypt.  We  have  seen 
them  become  the  depositaries  of  a  new  religion  in 
Mount  Sinai.  We  have  seen  them  in  their  first  flush 
of  conquest  in  the  Promised  Land.  We  have  now  to 
see  the  gradual  transition  from  their  primitive  state, 
and  to  track  them  through  the  interval  between  the 
death  of  Joshua  and  the  rise  of  Samuel — between  the 
establishment  of  the  sanctuary  at  Shiloh  on  the  first 
occupation  of  the  country,  and  its  final  overthrow  by 
the  Philistines. 

The  characteristics  of  this  period  are  such  as  es* 
pecially  invite  our  critical  and  historical  inquiries. 
Other  portions  of  Scripture  may  be  more  profitable 
“  for  doctrine,  for  correction,  for  reproof,  for  instruc- 
“  tion  in  righteousness ;  ”  but  for  merely  human  inter¬ 
est  —  for  the  lively  touches  of  ancient  manners  —  for 
the  succession  of  romantic  incidents  —  for  the  con- 
ciousness  that  we  are  living  face  to  face  with  the  per¬ 
sons  described — for  the  tragical  pathos  of  events  and 
characters  —  there  is  nothing  like  the  history  of  the 


316 


ISRAEL  UNDER  THE  JUDGES. 


lect.  xm. 


Judges  from  Othniel  to  Eli.  No  portion  of  the  Hebrew 
Scriptures,  whether  by  its  actual  date  or  by  the  vivid¬ 
ness  of  its  representations,  brings  us  so  near  to  the 
times  described ;  and  on  none  has  more  light  been 
thrown  by  the  German  scholar,  to  whose  investiga¬ 
tions  we  owe  so  much  in  the  study  of  the  Older  Dis¬ 
pensation.  It  would  seem,  if  one  may  venture  to  say 
so,  as  if  the  Book  of  Judges  had  been  left  in  the  Sacred 
Books,  with  the  express  view  of  enforcing  upon  us  the 
necessity  which  we  are  sometimes  anxious  to  evade, 
of  recognizing  the  human,  national,  let  us  even  add, 
barbarian  element  which  plays  its  part  in  the  sacred 
history.  In  other  portions  of  the  Hebrew  annals,  the 
Divine  character  of  the  Revelation  is  so  constantly 
before  us,  or  the  character  of  the  human  agents  reaches 
so  nearly  to  the  Divine,  that  we  may,  if  we  choose, 
almost  forget  that  we  are  reading  of  men  of  like  pas¬ 
sions  with  ourselves.  But  in  the  history  of  the  Judges, 
the  whole  tenor  of  the  book,  especially  of  its  conclud¬ 
ing  chapters,  renders  this  forgetfulness  impossible.  The 
angles  and  roughnesses  of  the  sacred  narrative,  which 
elsewhere  we  endeavor  to  smooth  down  into  one  uni¬ 
form  level,  here  start  out  from  the  surface  too  visibly 
to  be  overlooked  by  the  most  superficial  observer.  Like 
the  rugged  rock  which,  to  this  day,  breaks  the  plat¬ 
form  of  the  Temple  area  at  Jerusalem,  and  reminds  us 
of  the  bare  natural  features  of  the  mountain  that  must 
have  protruded  themselves  into  the  midst  of  the  mag¬ 
nificence  of  Solomon,  —  so  the  Book  of  Judges  recalls 
our  thoughts  from  the  ideal,  which  we  imagine  of  past 
and  of  sacred  ages,  and  reminds  us  by  a  rude  shock, 
that,  even  in  the  heart  of  the  Chosen  People,  even  in 
the  next  generation  after  Joshua,  there  were  irregu¬ 
larities,  imperfections,  excrescences,  which  it  is  the  glory 


Lect.  XIII. 


THE  DISORDERS. 


317 


/ 


of  the  Sacred  Historian  to  have  recorded  faithfully, 
and  which  it  will  be  our  wisdom  no  less  faithfully  to 
study. 

“In  those  days  there  was  no  king  in  Israel,1  but  every 
“  man  did  that  which  was  right  in  his  own  eyes.” 
“  In  those  days  there  was  no  king  in  Israel.”  “  It 
“  came  to  pass  in  those  days  when  there  was  no  king  in 
“  Israel.”  “  In  those  days  there  was  no  king  in  Israel.” 
“  every  man  did  that  which  was  right  in  his  own  eyes  ” 
This  sentence,  thus  frequently  and  earnestly  repeated, 
is  the  key-note  of  the  whole  book.  It  expresses  the 
freedom,  the  freshness,  the  independence,  —  the  license, 
the  anarchy,  the  disorder,  of  the  period.  It  tells  us 
that  we  are  in  a  period  of  transition,  gradually  draw¬ 
ing  near  to  that  time  when  there  will  be  a  “  king 
in  Israel,”  when  there  will  be  “  peace  on  all  sides 
“  round  about  him,  Judah  and  Israel  dwelling  safely, 
“  every  man  under  his  vine  and  under  his  fig-tree,  from 
“  Dan  unto  Beersheba.”  But  meantime  the  dark  and 
bright  sides  of  the  history  shift  with  a  rapidity  unknown 
in  the  latter  times  of  the  story  —  “  The  children  of 
“  Israel  did  evil  in  the  sight  of  the  Lord,”  and  “  The 
“children  of  Israel  cried  unto  the  Lord.” 2  Never 
was  there  a  better  instance  than  in  these  two  al¬ 
ternate  sentences,  ten  times  repeated,  that  we  need 
not  pronounce  any  age  entirely  bad  or  entirely  good. 

L  First,  then,  look  at  the  outward  relations  of  the 
country.  The  Conquest  was  over,  but  the  up-  outward 
heavings  of  the  conquered  population  still  con-  strussles* 
tinued.  The  ancient  inhabitants,  like  the  Saxons  un¬ 
der  the  Normans,  still  retained  their  hold  on  large 
tracts,  or  on  important  positions  throughout  the  coun- 

1  Judg.  xvii.  6;  xviii.  1;  xix.  1  ; 
xxi.  25. 


2  Judg.  ii.  4, 11, 18,  19  ;  iii.  7,  9,  12, 
15  ;  iv.  1,  3  ;  vi.  1,  7  ;  x.  6,  10  ;  xiii.  1. 


318 


ISRAEL  UNDER  THE  JUDGES. 


Lect.  xin. 


try.  The  neighboring  powers  still  looked  on  the  new¬ 
comers  as  an  easy  prey  to  incursion  and  devastation, 
if  not  to  actual  subjugation.  Against  these  enemies, 
both  from  without  and  from  within,  —  but  chiefly  from 
within,  a  constant  struggle  had  to  be  maintained ; 
with  all  the  dangers,  adventures,  and  trials  incident 
to  such  a  state,  —  a  war  of  independence  such  as  was 
not  to  occur  again  till  the  struggle  of  the  Maccabees 
against  the  Greek  kings,  or  even  of  the  last  insur¬ 
gents  against  the  Romans.  A  glance  at  the  first 
chapter  of  the  Book  of  Judges  will  show  in  a  mo¬ 
ment  the  motley,  parti-colored  character  which  Pales¬ 
tine  must  have  presented  after  the  death  of  Joshua. 
Nearly  the  whole  of  the  sea-coast,  all  the  strongholds 
in  the  rich  plain  of  Esdraelon,  and,  in  the  heart  of 
the  country  the  invincible  fortress  of  Jebus,  were 
still  in  the  hands  of  the  unbelievers.1  Every  one  of 
continua-  these  spots  was  a  focus  of  disaffection,  a  bone 

tion  of  the  1 

Conquest,  of  contention,  a  natural  field  of  battle.  Or 
look  at  the  relations  of  conquerors  and  conquered  as 
they  appear  in  the  story  of  Abimelech.2  The  insur¬ 
rection,  which  then  was  nearly  successful,  of  the  an¬ 
cient  Shechemites  —  the  “  sons  of  Emmor,  the  father 
of  Sychem  ”  —  reveals  the  fires  which  must  have  been 
smouldering  everywhere  throughout  the  land,  and  which 
would  have  broken  out  more  frequently,  had  the  gov¬ 
ernment  oftener  fallen  into  worthless  hands.  Or  look 
at  the  migration  of  the  sons  of  Dan.  It  is  like  the 
story  of  the  whole  nation  epitomized  over  again  in 
the  portion  of  a  single  tribe.  “  In  those  days  the 
“  tribe  of  the  Danites  sought  them  an  inheritance  to 
“  dwell  in.” 3  They  were  still  unprovided.  Spies  were 

1  See  Lecture  XII.  3  Josh.  xix.  47 ;  Judg.  xviii.  1-31. 

2  See  Lecture  XV. 


Lect.  xm. 


STATE  OF  CONFLICT. 


319 


sent  forth,  as  formerly  by  Moses  and  by  Joshua. 
They  return  with  the  account  of  a  land  "very  good/' 
“a  place  where  there  is  no  want  of  anything;”  and 
their  kinsmen  follow  their  guiding.  They  leave  the 
trace  of  their  encampment  on  their  road,1  like  a  sec¬ 
ond  Gilgal,  and  they  track  the  Jordan  to  its  source, 
and,  in  the  secluded  corner  under  Mount  Hermon,  fall 
on  the  easternmost  of  the  Phoenician  colonies,  and  es¬ 
tablish  themselves  in  that  beautiful  and  fertile  spot, 
with  a  sanctuary  of  their  own,  and  a  priesthood  of 
their  own,  during  the  whole  period  of  which  we  are 
speaking. 

Slowly,  gradually,  the  dominion  of  the  Chosen  Peo¬ 
ple  was  left  to  work  its  way.  First,  they  re-  Successive 
pel  distant  invaders  from  Mesopotamia.  This  confllcts* 
is  the  special  work  of  the  Lion  of  the  tribe  of  Judah, 
—  of  the  last  hero  of  the  old  generation.  Then,  under 
Deborah  and  Barak,  they  encounter  the  final  rising 
of  the  Canaanites.2  The  battle  of  Merom  is  repeated 
over  again  by  the  waters  of  Megiddo.  In  that  cen¬ 
tral  conflict  of  the  period,  Israel  and  Canaan  met  to¬ 
gether  for  the  last  time  face  to  face  in  battle.  Then 
follows  the  most  trying  invasion  to  which  the  country 
had  been  ever  subjected,3  —  the  wild  Midianite  hordes 
from  the  desert.  How  great  was  the  crisis,  is  proved 
by  the  greatness  of  the  champion  who  was  called 
forth  to  resist  it.  In  Gideon  and  his  family  we  see 
the  nearest  approach  to  a  king  that  this  epoch  pro¬ 
duces.  Finally,  they  are  brought  into  collision  with 
the  new  enemies,  —  the  race  of  strangers,  —  who,  as  it 
would  seem,  had  barely  settled  in  Palestine  at  the 
time  of  the  first  conquest,  —  the  “Philistines,”4  —  and 


1  Judg.  xiii.  25  ;  xviii.  12. 

2  See  Lecture  XIV. 


3  See  Leeture  XV. 
*  See  Lecture  XVI. 


320 


ISRAEL  UNDER  THE  JUDGES. 


Lect.  XIII. 


amidst  the  death-struggle  with  them  under  Samson, 
Eli,  and  Samuel,  ends  this  period  of  the  history. 

It  was  a  hard  discipline ;  it  must  have  checked  the 
Military  progress  of  arts,  of  civilization,  of  refinement. 
oMhe'na-  But  it  was  the  fitting  school  through  which 
t,on-  they  were  to  pa&s.  It  was  the  formation  of 
the  military  character  of  the  people.  It  prepared 
the  way  for  the  inauguration  of  the  new  name  by 
which,  in  the  next  period  of  their  history,  God  would 
be  called,  —  the  “  Lord  of  Hosts.”  Though  a  succes¬ 
sion  of  failures,  they  stumbled  into  perfection.  Amidst 
these  struggles  for  independence  was  nourished  no 
less  a  youth  than  that  of  David.  “  Therefore  the 
“  Lord  left  those  nations,  without  driving  them  out 
u  hastily :  ”  to  prove  u  Israel  by  them ;  even  as  many  as 
“  had  not  known  the  wars  of  Canaan ;  only  that  the 
“  generations  of  Israel  might  know  to  teach  them  war, 
66  at  the  least  such  as  before  knew  nothing  thereof.” 1 
Without  this  discipline,  they  might  have  sunk  into 
mere  Phoenician  settlements,  like  the  a  people  of  Laish, 
“  dwelling  careless,  after  the  manner  of  the  Zidonians, 
“  quiet  and  secure,” 2  having  no  business  with  any  man, 
“  in  a  large  land,  where  there  was  no  want  of  any- 
“  thing  that  is  in  the  earth.”  .Like  their  Phoenician 
neighbors,  like  their  own  descendants  in  later  times, 
they  might  have  become  a  mere  nation  of  merchants : 
“  Dan  would  have  abode  in  his  ships,  and  Asher  would 
a  have  remained  in  his  creeks  by  the  sea-shore,”  and 
not  u  a  shield  or  spear  would  have  been  seen  amongst 
“  forty  thousand  in  Israel.”  But  their  spirit  rose  to 
the  emergencies.  Faithful  tribes,  like  Zebulun  and 
Naphtali,  were  always  found  amongst  the  faithless,  ready 
to  jeopardize  their  lives  for  the  nation.  Be  versing 

1  Judg.  ii.  23;  iii.  1,  2.  2  Ibid,  xviii.  7-9. 


Lect.  XIII. 


INTERNAL  DISORDER. 


321 


the  Prophetic  visions  of  an  ideal  future,  their  pruning- 
hooks  were  turned  into  spears,  and  their  ploughshares 
into  swords.  They  had  u  files  to  sharpen  their  coul¬ 
ters,  their  mattocks,1  and  their  goads;”  and  Shamgar, 
the  son  of  Anath,  came  with  his  rude  ox-goad,  and 
Samson  with  his  quaint  devices,  —  the  jawbone  of  an 
ass,  and  the  firebrands  at  the  tails  of  jackals,  —  devas¬ 
tating  the  country  of  their  enemies. 

II.  But  it  is  chiefly  in  their  internal  relations  that 
this  transitional  state  appears.  “  There  was  no  king 
in  Israel,”  no  fixed  capital,  no  fixed  sanctuary,  no 
fixed  government.  It  was  a  heptarchy,  a  dodecarchy, 
of  which  the  supremacy  passed,  as  in  the  early  ages 
of  our  own  country,  first  to  one  tribe  and  then  to 
another. 

Even  in  a  religious  point  of  view,  now  one,  now 
another  place  presents  itself  as  the  rallying-  Internai 
point  of  the  nation.  The  sacred  solitary  palm-  dlsorder* 
tree  was  the  spot  to  which  at  one  time  the  children 
of  Israel  came  up  for  judgment.2  Another  was  the 
sanctuary  of  Micah,3  visited  as  an  oracle  by  wandering 
travellers  and  pilgrims.  A  third  was  the  greensward 
on  the  broad  summit  of  Tabor,4  the  gathering-place 
of  the  northern  tribes.  A  fourth  was  the  little  capi¬ 
tal  of  the  northern  Dan,  already  mentioned,  beside 
the  sources  of  the  Jordan.  Doubtless  amidst  all  these 
variations,  the  national  feeling  still  turned  chiefly  to 
two  spots,  the  old  primeval  stone  or  structure  called 
u  the  House  of  God  ”  —  “  Bethel ;  ”  the  other,  the 
modern  sanctuary  of  Shiloh,  set  up  by  Joshua.  But 
even  these  were  tokens  of  division  and  independence. 
At  the  close  of  the  period,  the  High  Priesthood,  the 

-  1  Sam.  xiii.  21. 

2  See  Lecture  XIV. 

41 


3  Lecture  XIII. 

4  Lectures  XIV.  XV. 


322 


ISRAEL  UNDER  THE  JUDGES. 


lect.  xin. 


one  great  office  which  had  been  bequeathed  by  the 
Mosaic  age,  appears  at  Shiloh.  But  in  its  earlier 
years,  we  find  it  established  at  Bethel,  and  the 
Ark  itself,  as  if  suffering  in  the  general  disintegrar 
tion  of  the  people,  repqsed  not  within  the  sacred 
tent  of  Shiloh,  but  within  the  primitive  sanctuary 
of  Bethel. 

In  like  manner,  no  one  tribe  exercises  undisputed 
preeminence.  Ephraim,  on  the  whole,  retains  the 
primacy,  but  not  exclusively.  Judah,  after  the  death 
of  Othniel,  disappears  almost  entirely.  “  There  was 
no  king  in  Israel,”  there  was  no  succession  of  Proph¬ 
ets.  Long  blanks  occur  in  the  history,  of  which  we 
know  nothing.  From  time  to  time  deliverers  were 
The  office  raised  up,  as  occasion  called,  and  the  Spirit 

of  ^  The 

Judges.”  of  the  Lord  came  upon  them  ;  and  again,  on 
their  death,  the  central  bond  was  broken,  and  the 
thread  of  the  history  is  lost.  The  office,  which  gives  its 
name  to  the  period,  well  describes  it.  It  was  occasion¬ 
al,  irregular,  uncertain,  yet  gradually  tending  to  fixed¬ 
ness  and  perpetuity.  Its  title  is  itself  expressive.  The 
Euler  was  not  regal,  but  he  was  more  than  the  mere 
head  of  a  tribe,  or  the  mere  judge  of  special  cases. 
We  have  to  seek  for  the  origin  of  the  name  not 
amongst  the  Sheiks  of  the  Arabian  desert,  but  amongst 
the  civilized  settlements  of  Phoenicia.  Shofet  —  Sho- 
fetim,1  the  Hebrew  word  which  we  translate  “Judge,” 
is  the  same  as  we  find  in  the  “Suffes,”2  “Suffetes,” 
of  the  Carthaginian  rulers  at  the  time  of  the  Punic 
Wars.  As  afterwards  the  office  of  “king”  was  taken 

1  Josephus  (c.  Apian,  i.  21)  de-  dices.”  The  office  most  nearly  cor- 

scribes  judges  (di/cacrraz)  as  succeed-  responding  to  it  in  the  West  was  that 
ing  to  the  Tyrian  kings.  of  “  iEsymnetes  ”  in  Greek  nistory. 

2  Liv.  xxx.  7  ;  xxviii.  37.  In  xxxiii.  See  Aristotle,  Politics ,  Hi.  9,  §  5,  iv.  8. 
46,  xxxiv.  61,  they  are  called  “  ju-  §  2. 


Lect.  XIII. 


THE  OFFICE  OF  THE  JUDGES. 


323 


from  the  nations  round  about,  so  now  if  not  the 
office,  at  least  the  name  of  “ judge”  or  “shofet,” 
seems  to  have  been  drawn  from  the  Canaanitish  cities 
with  which  for  the  first  time  Israel  came  into  contact. 
It  is  the  first  trace  of  the  influence  of  the  Syrian 
usages  on  the  fortunes  of  the  Chosen  People,  the  firstr 
fruits  of  the  Pagan  inheritance  to  which  the  Jewish 
and  the  Christian  Church  has  succeeded.  Gradually 
the  office  so  formed  consolidates  itself.  Of  Othniel, 
Ehud,  and  Shamgar,  we  know  not  whether  they  ruled 
beyond  the  limits  of  the  special  crisis  which  called 
them  forth.  But  in  Deborah  and  Gideon  we  see  the 
indications  of  a  rule  for  life.  In  Gideon,  we  find  the 
attempt  at  a  regular  monarchy  made  and  rejected, 
yet  still  virtually  maintained  in  his  lifetime,  and  for¬ 
mally  revived,  after  his  death,  by  his  son  Abimelech. 
In  the  succession  of  obscure  rulers  who  follow,  the 
hereditary  principle  has  established  itself.  Sons  and 
grandsons  inherit,  if  not  the  power,  at  least  the  pomp 
and  state  of  their  father  and  grandfather.1  And, 
finally,  the  two  offices,  which  in  the  earlier  years  of 
this  period  had  remained  distinct,  —  the  High  Priest 
and  the  Judge,  —  were  united  in  the  person  of  Eli; 
and  Samuel,  who  acted  as  the  interpreter  between 
the  old  and  the  new  order  of  his  people,  had  actu¬ 
ally  transmitted  the  office  by  hereditary  succession 
to  his  sons,  and  they  for  the  first  time  appear  exer¬ 
cising  those  “judicial”2  functions  which  alone  are 
expressed  in  the  modern  translation  of  Shophet  into 
“  Judge.” 

III.  In  connection  with  this  Phoenician  origin  of 
the  name  of  these  rulers,  other  customs,  as  Phcenician 
might  be  expected  from  the  near  neighbor- influences- 

1  Judg.  x.  3,  4 ;  xii.  8-14. 


2  1  Sam.  viii.  3. 


324 


ISRAEL  UNDER  THE  JUDGES. 


Lect.  XIII. 


The  name 
of  Baal. 


hood,  now  first  appear,  in  every  shade  of  good  and 
evil,  from  the  same  source.  The  temptations  to  idol¬ 
atry  are  no  longer  of  the  same  kind  as  in  Mesopo¬ 
tamia,  or  in  Egypt.  Two  forms  of  worship  rise  above 
all  others,  —  the  two  Phoenician  deities,  Baal 
and  Astarte,  —  as  seducing  the  Israelites  from 
their  allegiance,  marked  everywhere  by  the  image  and 
altar,  or  the  grove  of  olive  or  ilex  round  the  sacred 
rock  or  stone  on  which  the  altar  was  erected.  Relics 
of  such  worship  continued  long  afterwards  in  the 
names,  probably  derived  from  this  period,  both  of 
places  and  persons.  Everywhere  throughout  the  land 
lingered  the  traces  of  the  old  idolatrous  sanctuaries, 
—  Baal-Gad,  Baal-Hermon,  Baal-Tamar,  Baal-Hazor, 
Baal-Judah,  Baal-Meon,  Baal-Perazim,  Baal-Shalisha, 
like  the  memorials  of  Saxon  heathenism,  or  of  medi¬ 
aeval  superstition,  which  furnish  the  nomenclature  of  so 
many  spots  in  our  own  country.  And  even  in  fam¬ 
ilies,  as  in  that  of  Saul,1  we  find  that  the  title  of  the 
Phoenician  god  appears,  as  in  the  names  so  common 
in  Tyre  and  Carthage,  —  Maherbal,  Hannibal,  Asdrubal. 

But  the  most  distinct  and  peculiar  mark  of  the 
The  wor-  Phoenician  worship  at  this  time  —  and  not  un- 
Baai  Be-  naturally  adopted  in  the  license  given  to 
every  form  of  independent  organization  and 
association  —  is  that  of  cities  congregated  in  leagues 
round  such  a  temple  of  Baal,  hence  called  Baal  Be- 
nth,  ec  Baal  of  the  League ;  ” 2  as  in  the  combination 
of  Tyre,  Sidon,  and  Arvad  to  found  Tripolis,  as  in 
the  Carthaginian  settlements  which  in  Sicily  formed 
themselves  round  the  Temple  of  Astarte  at  Eryx,  as 
in  the  Canaanitish  League  of  Gibeon.  The  chief  in- 

1  Baal,  Eshbaal,  and  Meribbaal,  1  2  See  Ewald,  ii.  445  ;  Lecture 

Chron.  viii.  30,  33,  34.  XV. 


Lect.  XIII. 


PHOENICIAN  INFLUENCES. 


325 


stance  of  it  is  the  League  of  Shechem  and  Thebez 
round  the  Temple  of  the  League  at  Shechem,  under 
the  half-Canaanite  king  Abimelech,  the  first  organized 
form  of  Canaanite  polity  and  worship  within  the  pre¬ 
cincts  of  Israel. 

Another  practice,  which  falls  in  with  the  wild 
usages  of  the  time,  has  also  a  direct  affinity  Phoenician 
with  Phoenician  customs,  —  the  frequent  use  vows’ 
of  vows.  One  memorable  instance  of  a  Phoenician 
vow  has  been  handed  down  to  us,  so  solemn  in  its 
origin,  so  grand  in  its  consequences,  that  even  the 
vows  of  the  most  sacred  ages  need  not  fear  compari¬ 
son  with  it.  The  impulse  from  his  early  oath  which 
nerved  the  courage  and  patriotism  of  Hannibal  from 
childhood  to  age,  in  his  warfare  against  Rome,1  may 
well  be  taken  as  an  illustration  of  the  feeling  which, 
in  its  highest  and  noblest  forms,  led  to  the  consecra¬ 
tion  of  Samson  and  Samuel,  and,  in  its  unauthorized 
excesses,  to  the  rash  vows,  of  the  whole  nation 
against  the  tribe  of  Benjamin,  of  Jephthah  against 
his  daughter,  of  Saul  against  Jonathan.  These  spas¬ 
modic  efforts  after  self-restraint  are  precisely  what 
we  should  expect  in  an  age  which  had  no  other 
mode  of  steadying  its  purposes  amidst  the  general 
anarchy  in  which  it  was  enveloped,  and  accordingly 
in  that  age  they  first  appear,  and  within  its  limits 
expire. 

IV.  But  whatever  traces  there  may  be  of  foreign 
influence,  the  heart  of  the  people  and  their  Primitive 
manners  remained  essentially  Israelite,  and  onFfe.clty 
the  disorders  of  the  time  breathe  always  the  air 
rather  of  the  desert  than  of  the  city.  We  see  the 
princes  and  the  judges  riding  in  state  on  their  asses, 

1  See  Arnold’s  Rome ,  iii.  33. 


326 


ISRAEL  UNDER  THE  JUDGES. 


Lect.  XIIL 


the  asses  of  the  Bedouin  tribe,  abhorred  of  Egypt. 
“  Speak,  ye  that  ride  on  she-asses,  dappled  with 
white,”  is  the  address  of  Deborah  to  the  victorious 
chiefs  returning  from  battle.  The  thirty  sons  of  Jair 
ride  on  their  thirty  ass  polts,  which  the  play  on  the 
word  connects  with  their  thirty  cities.1  As  in  the 
wilderness,  the  assemblies  of  the  people  are  still  gath¬ 
ered  by  the  fresh  springs  or  the  running  streams. 
“  At  the  places  ” 2  or  “  amongst  the  companies  of  the 
“  drawing  of  water,  are  rehearsed  the  righteous  acts 
“  of  the  Lord.”  “  By  the  streams  of  Reuben  are  the 
“  divisions  and  searchings  of  heart.”  Tents  may  still 
be  seen  beside  the  settled  habitations.  The  Arab 
Kenites  still  linger  in  the  south.  A  settlement  of 
the  same  tribe  is  planted  far  north  also,  under  the 
ancient  oak,  called  from  their  encampment  “the  oak 
“of  the  unloading  of  tents,”3  and  underneath  the  tent 
of  Jael,  the  wife  of  Heber,  every  Bedouin  custom  was 
as  purely  preserved  as  in  the  time  of  Abraham.  The 
sanctuary  of  Shiloh  itself  was  still  a  tent;  or  rather, 
according  to  the  Rabbinical  representations,  which 
have  every  appearance  of  truth,  a  low  structure  of 
stones  with  a  tent  drawn  over  it,  exactly  like  the 
Bedouin  village,  an  intermediate  stage  between  a 
mere  collection  of  tents  and  a  fixed  precinct  of  build¬ 
ings.  And  although  a  city  grew^  round  it,  and  a 
stone  gateway  rose  in  front  of  it,  yet  it  still  retained 
its  name  of  the  “  camp  of  Shiloh ;  ”  and  the  sanctuary 
was  only  known  as  the  “ tabernacle  or  tent  that  God 
“  had  pitched  among  men.”  4 

Accordingly  the  whole  period  breathes  a  primitive 

1  Judg.  x.  4.  4  Mishna  (Surenhusius)  vol.  v.  59; 

2  Ibid.  v.  11,  15,  16.  Seder  Olam,  e.  11.  Ps.  lxxviii.  60, 

3  See  Lecture  XIV.  See  Lecture  XVII. 


Lect.  XIII. 


THE  STORY  OF  MICAH. 


327 


simplicity  which  peculiarly  belongs  both  to  the  crimes 
and  the  virtues  of  this  earliest  stage  of  the  occupation 
of  Canaan.  The  Book  of  Judges  closes  with  three 
pictures,  of  which  the  two  first,  at  least,  appear  to 
have  been  inserted  with  the  express  purpose,  so  un¬ 
usual  in  the  sacred  history,  —  so  unusual,  one  may 
add,  in  any  history,  till  within  the  most  recent  times, 
—  of  giving  an  insight  into  what  we  should  call  the 
state  of  society  in  Judea.  How  precious  to  us  would 
be  any  details  of  the  private  life  and  incidental  cus¬ 
toms  of  Greece  or  Rome,  equal  to  what  are  afforded 
in  the  stories  of  Micah,  of  the  war  with  Benjamin, 
and  of  Ruth  !  Though  appended  to  the  close  of  the 
book,  they  form,  both  by  their  style  and  by  the  actual 
order  of  the  events  which  they  relate,  its  natural 
preface.1 

1.  Take  the  expedition  of  the  Danites.  They  start, 
as  we  have  seen,  once  more  to  seek  new  set-  The  story 
tlements  —  they  track  the  Jordan  to  its  source,  Rankes 
and  then  mark  out  for  their  prey  the  easy  and  Mlcah> 
colonists  from  Sidon  in  the  rich  and  beautiful  seclu¬ 
sion  of  that  loveliest  of  the  scenes  of  Palestine.  It  is 
the  exact  likeness  of  the  Frankish  or  Norman  migra¬ 
tions,  reopening  the  path  of  conquest  and  discovery, 
when  it  had  seemed  all  closed  and  ended  with  the 
final  settlement  of  Europe.  And  still  more  character¬ 
istic  is  the  incident  which  is  interwoven  with  their 
expedition,  and  which  opens  another  vista  into  the 
mingled  superstition  and  religion  which  swayed  the 
feelings  of  the  time.  We  are  introduced  to  the  house 
of  Micah,  on  the  ridge  of  the  hills  of  Ephraim;  we 
hear  the  frank  disclosure  of  Micah  to  his  mother,  how 

1  This  arrangement  is  actually  adopted  by  Josephus  {Ant.  v.  2,  §§8-12; 

».§!)• 


328 


ISRAEL  UNDER  THE  JUDGES. 


Lect.  XIII, 


he  was  the  thief  who  had  carried  off  her  shekels  — 
and  we  see  the  mother’s  grateful  dedication  of  her  re¬ 
stored  property.  Their  isolation  from  the  central  wor¬ 
ship  of  Palestine  soon  manifests  itself.  The  house 
becomes  a  castle ;  and  not  only  a  castle,  but  a  temple. 
The  Sane-  ^ik e  fhe  sanctuary  of  Shiloh  itself,  it  stands 
tuary.  in  a  court;  entered  by  a  spacious  gateway. 
Pound  about  it  gather  houses  of  those  who  take  a 
common  interest  in  this  worship,  and  a  caravansary 
for  strangers.  Within  is  a  chamber,  called  “  the  House 
of  God,”  and  in  this  chamber  are  two  silver  images, 
one  sculptured,  one  molten,  clothed  in  a  mask  and 
priestly  mantle,1  so  as  to  represent  as  nearly  as  possi¬ 
ble  the  Priestly  Oracle  at  Shiloh.  And  when  we  in¬ 
quire  further  into  the  worship  of  this  little  sanctuary, 
still  stranger  scenes  disclose  themselves.  The  five 
Danite  warriors,  as  they  pass  by,  and  lodge  in  the  car¬ 
avansary,  are  arrested  by  the  sound  of  a  well-known 
voice.  It  is  the  voice  of  a  Levite  of  Bethlehem,  whom 
they  had  known  whilst  in  their  southern  settlement. 
They  ask  him,  “  Who  brought  thee  hither  ?  and  what 
u  makest  thou  in  this  place  ?  and  what  hast  thou  here  ?  ” 
They  ask  him,  and  we,  with  our  precise  notions  of  Le- 
vitical  ritual,  may  well  ask  him  too.  He  tells  his  own 
wild  story.  He,  like  them,  had  been  a  wanderer  for 
a  better  home  than  he  found  in  the  little  village  of 
Bethlehem.  He,  like  them,  had  halted  by  the  house 
of  Micah,  on  the  ridge  of  Ephraim;  and  the  supersti¬ 
tion  of  Micah  and  the  interest  of  the  Levite  combined. 
The  one,  like  many  a  feudal  noble,  was  eager  to  se- 


1  Judg.  xvii.  4.  Of  these  two  im¬ 
ages,  one  (apparently  as  large  as  a 
man,  1  Sam.  xix.  16),  from  its  mask, 
was  called  Teraphim ,  from  its  mantle 
Ephod.  Such  images  were  used  as 


oracles,  Zech.  x.  2,  and  as  appurte¬ 
nances  of  public  worship,  Hos.  iii.  4  , 
and  the  custom  was  finally  put  down 
by  Josiah,  2  Kings  xxiii.  24.  (See 
Ewald,  Alterth.  256-8). 


Lect.  XIII. 


THE  STORY  OF  MICAH. 


329 


cure  the  services  and  sanction  of  a  regular  chaplain 
for  his  new  establishment.  The  other,  like  many  a  feu¬ 
dal  priest,  was  willing  to  secure  “  ten  shekels  of  silver 
“  by  the  year,  and  a  suit  of  apparel,  and  his  victuals.” 
So  the  Levite  went  in,  and  “  was  content  to  dwell  with 
the  man,”  was  unto  him  as  one  of  his  sons ;  and  Mi- 
cah  consecrated  the  Levite,  and  the  young  man  be¬ 
came  his  priest,  and  occupied  one  of  the  dwellings  by 
the  house  of  Micah.1  Then  said  Micah,  “  Now  know  I 
“  that  the  Lord  will  do  me  good,  seeing  I  have  a  Le- 
“  vite  to  my  priest  ” 

But  as  the  story  unravels  itself,  still  further  does  it 
lead  us  into  the  manners  and  the  spirit  of  the  time. 
The  same  feelings  which  had  prompted  Micah  to 
secure  the  wandering  treasure,  were  shared  by  the 
Danite  warriors,  who  had  recognized  in  him  their  old 
acquaintance.  They  had  received  his  blessing  on  their 
enterprise  as  they  passed  by  on  their  first  expedition. 
They  suggested  to  their  countrymen,  on  their  advance 
to  accomplish  their  design,  that  here  was  the  religious 
sanction  which  alone  they  needed  to  render  it  success¬ 
ful.  “Do  ye  know,”  they  said  as  they  ap-  The  theft 
proached  the  well-known  cluster  of  houses  on  relics, 
the  hill-side  —  “  Do  ye  know  that  there  is  in  these 
“  houses  an  ephod,  and  teraphim,  and  a  graven  image, 
“  and  a  molten  image  ?  Now  therefore  consider  what 
“  ye  have  to  do.”  In  the  centre  of  the  settlement  rose 
the  house  of  Micah,  and  at  its  gateway  was  the  dwell¬ 
ing  of  the  Levite.  By  the  gateway  the  six  hundred 
armed  warriors  stood  conversing  with  their  ancient 
leighbor,  whilst  the  five  men  stole  up  the  rocky  court, 
and  into  the  little  chapel,  and  fetched  away  the  im¬ 
ages  with  teraphim  and  ephod  ;  and,  long  before  they 

1  Judg.  xviii.  15. 


42 


330 


ISRAEL  UNDER  THE  JUDGES. 


Lect.  XHI 


were  discovered,  were  far  along  their  northern  route. 
The  priest  has  raised  his  voice  against  the  theft  for  a 
moment.  “  What  do  ye  ?  ”  But  there  is  a  ready  bribe. 
“  Hold  thy  peace,  lay  thine  hand  upon  thy  mouth,  and 
“  go  with  us  ;  and  he  to  us  a  father  and  a  priest :  is  it 
“  better  for  thee  to  be  a  priest  unto  the  house  of  one 
“  man,  or  that  thou  become  a  priest  unto  a  tribe  and 
“  family  in  Israel  ?  ” 1 

“  Hold  thy  peace,  lay  thine  hand  upon  thy  mouth,” 
— so  almost  in  the  same  words  was  the  like  bribe  offered 
by  one  of  the  greatest  religious  houses  of  England  to 
the  monk  who  guarded  the  shrine  of  one  of  the  most 
sacred  relics  in  the  adjacent  cathedral  of  Canterbury. 
—  “  Give  us  the  portion  of  S.  Thomas’s  skull  which  is 
“  in  thy  custody,  and  thou  shalt  cease  to  he  a  simple 
“  monk  ;  thou  shalt  be  Abbot  of  S.  Augustine’s.”  2  As 
Roger  accepted  the  bait  in  the  twelfth  century  after 
the  Christian  era,  so  did  the  Levite  of  Micah’s  house 
in  the  fifteenth  century  before  it.  “And  the  priest’s 
“  heart  was  glad,  and  he  took  the  ephod,  and  the  tera- 
“  phim,  and  the  graven  image,  and  went  in  the  midst 
“  of  the  people.”  The  theft  was  so  adroitly  managed, 
that  the  soldiers  were  far  away  before  Micah  and  his 
neighbors  overtook  them,  and  uttered  a  wail  of  grief 
and  rage.  The  whole  neighborhood  had  a  common 
interest  in  the  sanctuary ;  and  Micah,  in  particu¬ 
lar,  felt  that  his  importance  was  gone.  “Ye  have 
“  taken  away  my  gods  which  I  made,  and  the  priest, 
“  and  ye  are  gone  away ;  and  what  have  I  more  ?  ” 
But  they  are  too  strong  for  him,  and  they  advance 
to  the  easy  conquest  which  gives  them  their  new 
home. 

In  the  biography  of  this  one  Levite,  thus  acciden- 

1  Judg.  xviii.  14-19.  2  Thorne’s  Chronicle,  1176. 


Lect.  XIII.  STORY  OF  THE  LEVITE  OF  BETHLEHEM.  331 


tally,  as  it  were,  brought  to  view,  we  have  a  sample 
of  the  darker  side  of  his  tribe,  as  brought  The  Sanc- 
out  in  the  curse  of  Jacob,  —  “  I  will  divide  Dan.  ‘ 

“  them  in  Jacob  and  scatter  them  in  Israel,”  —  lending 
himself  to  the  highest  bidder,  to  Micah  first  for  ten 
shekels  a  year  and  food  and  clothing,  to  the  Danites 
afterwards,  that  he  might  become  a  Priest  of  a  tribe 
and  family  in  Israel  rather  than  to  the  house  of  one 
man.  He  had  his  reward;  he  became  a  Father  and 
Patriarch  to  the  new  commonwealth.  Under  his  aus¬ 
pices  on  the  green  hill  by  the  sources  of  the  Jordan 
a  new  sanctuary  was  established ;  the  graven  image 
remained  there  undisturbed  during  the  whole  period 
of  the  Judges,  66  all  the  time  that  the  House  of  God 
“  was  in  Shiloh ;  ”  and  he  and  his  sons  founded  a  long 
line  of  Priests,  for  the  same  period,  “  Priests  to  the 
“  tribe  of  Dan  until  the  day 1  of  the  captivity  of  the 
“  land.”  And  who  was  this  stranger  Levite  ?  this 
founder  of  a  schismatical  worship  ?  Was  he  of  some 
obscure  family,  that  might  be  thought  to  have  escaped 
the  higher  influences  of  the  age  ?  So  from  the  larger 
part  of  the  narrative,  so  from  the  dexterous  alteration 
of  the  text  by  later  copyists  in  the  one  passage  which 
reveals  the  secret,  it  might  have  been  inferred.  But 
that  one  passage,  according  to  the  reading  of  several 
Hebrew  manuscripts,  and  of  the  Vulgate,  and  according 
to  an  ancient  Jewish  tradition,  and  to  the  almost  cer¬ 
tain  conjecture  both  of  Kennicott  and  of  Ewald,  tells 
us  who  he  was:  —  “  Jonathan,  the  son  of  Gershom, — 
the  son  ”  —  not,  as  we  now  read,  of  Manasseh,2  The  grand- 
but  “  of  Moses.”  Whether  it  was  from  the  Moses. 

1  Judg.  xviii.  30,  31.  For  these  is,  in  the  Hebrew  text,  by  the  inser- 

expressions,  see  Lecture  XVII.  tion  of  a  single  letter,  turned  into  Ma - 

2  Judg.  xviii.  30.  The  word  Moseh  nasseh.  In  1  Chron.  xxiii.  15,  16, 


332 


ISRAEL  UNDER  THE  JUDGES. 


Lect.  XIII. 


general  laxity  of  the  time,  or  from  the  obscurity  which 
throughout  envelops  the  family  of  the  great  lawgiver, 
there  can  be  little  doubt  that  this  type  of  the  wander¬ 
ing,  ambitious,  lawless  Priest  of  this  and  so  many  after¬ 
ages,  was  no  less  than  £he  grandson  of  the  Prophet 
Moses.  What  Jewish  copyists  have  done  here  by 
endeavoring  to  change  the  honored  name  of  Moses 
into  the  hated  name  of  Manasseh,  is  what  has  been 
often  attempted  in  the  later  history  of  the  church,  by 
endeavoring  to  conceal,  or  to  palliate,  the  excesses  or 
errors  or  irregularities  of  the  inferior  successors  of 
noble  predecessors.  Let  the  story  of  the  grandson  of 
Moses  be  at  once  an  illustration  of  the  fact,  and  a 
warning  to  us  not  to  make  too  much  of  it.  A  profli¬ 
gate  and  heretical  Pope  in  a  profligate  or  heretical 
age,  a  turbulent  or  timeserving  Reformer  in  a  turbu¬ 
lent  or  timeserving  age,  are  not  of  such  importance 
for  the  succeeding  or  preceding  history,  as  that  we 
should  be  very  eager  either  to  conceal  or  to  affirm 
the  fact  of  their  existence.  Each  age  has  its  own  er¬ 
rors  and  sins  to  bear.  Jonathan  the  son  of  Gershom, 
and  the  long  succession  of  the  priesthood  which  he 
transmitted,  are  indeed  illustrative  of  the  time  to  which 
they  belonged,  are  exact  likenesses  of  what  has  occurred 
again  and  again  in  like  confusions  of  the  Christian 
Church,  —  but  prove  nothing  beyond  themselves,  and 
need  not  either  be  kept  out  of  sight,  on  the  one  hand, 
or  made  into  standing  arguments,  on  the  other  hand, 
against  the  Church  which,  for  the  time,  they  repre¬ 
sented. 

2.  No  less  characteristic  of  the  good  and  evil  of  the 

occurs  Shebuel ,  son  of  Gershom,  son  Diet,  of  Bible,  “  Jonathan,”  “  Manas- 
of  Moses.  —  Jerome  ( Qu .  Heb.  ad  V)  seh.”) 
says  that  lie  was  Micah’s  Levite.  (See 


Lect.  XIII. 


THE  WAR  OF  BENJAMIN. 


333 


period  is  the  story  of  the  war  of  the  eleven  tribes 
against  their  brother  Benjamin  for  the  outrage  The  story 
committed  by  the  inhabitants  of  Gibeah.  Here,  $  Been7ar 
again,  is  a  roving  Levite  of  irregular  life.  jamm' 
Every  step  of  his  journey  shows  us  a  glimpse  of  the 
state  of  the  country.  His  father-in-law  entertains  him 
with  true  Arabian  hospitality,  day  after  day,  night  af¬ 
ter  night.  Amidst  the  shadows  of  the  evening,  “  when 
66  the  day  is  far  spent,”  we  see  the  towers  of  “  Jehus 
u  which  is  Jerusalem,”  still  in  the  hands  of  the  Ca- 
naanites.  The  apprehension  of  the  travellers  as  they 
find  themselves  overtaken  by  darkness  is  exactly  that 
which  still  attends  the  fall  of  night  in  any  country 
where  the  unsettled  state  of  the  government  makes 
itself  felt  in  robbers  and  outlaws.  Outside  the  town 
of  Gibeah,  in  the  open  space  beneath  the  walls,  on 
what  in  the  “  Arabian  Nights  ”  are  so  often  called 
“  the  mounds,”  the  little  band  encamps.  Then  comes 
the  aged  countryman  from  the  fields,  and  the  dark 
crime  which  follows,  and  the  ferocious  summons  of  the 
whole  people  to  vengeance  by  the  signal  of  the  di¬ 
vided  bones  of  the  outraged  woman.1  Both  the  atro¬ 
city  and  the  indignation  which  it  excites  belong  alike 
to  the  primitive  stage  of  a  people,  when,  as  the  his¬ 
torian  observes,  tanto  acrior  apad  majores  id  virtutibus 
gloria ,  ita  flagitiis  poenitentia.  There  is  nothing  in  later 
times  like  the  original  outrage.  But  neither  is  there 
anything  in  later  times  like  the  universal  burst  of  hor- 


1  Judg.  xix.  29.  A  like  summons 
is  issued  within  this  same  period,  1 
Sam.  xi.  7.  A  similar  incident  is  said 
to  have  occurred  recently  in  the  tribes 
near  Damascus.  An  Arab  woman 
having  been  accused  of  unchastity  by 
another,  was  killed  by  her  father,  who 


then  tore  her  body  open  in  the  pres¬ 
ence  of  the  tribe,  and  found  that  she 
was  innocent.  The  slanderer  was  then 
judged.  Her  tongue  was  cut  out,  and 
she  was  hewn  into  small  pieces,  which 
were  sent  all  over  the  desert. 


334 


ISRAEL  UNDER  THE  JUDGES. 


Lect.  XIH. 


ror.  “  We  will  not  any  of  us  go  to  his  tent,  neither 
“  will  we  any  of  us  turn  into  his  house ;  but  now  this 
“  shall  be  the  thing  which  we  will  do  unto  Gibeah  . 
“ .  .  according  to  the  folly  that  they  have  wrought 

“  in  Israel.  So  all  the  men  of  Israel  were  gathered 
“  together  against  the  city,  knit  together  as  one  man/’ 
There  are  many  wars  in  Israel  after  this,  civil  and 
foreign,  but  none  breathing  so  ardent  a  spirit  of  zeal, 
excessive,  extravagant  zeal  it  may  be,  against  moral 
evil.  As  in  the  former  story,  so  here,  we  meet  with 
one  who  had  known  the  old  generation.  As  before  it 
was  the  grandson  of  Moses,  so  here  it  is  the  grandson 
Phinehas.  of  Aaron.  But  Phinehas  the  son  of  Eleazar 
was  made  of  sterner  and  better  stuff  than  Jonathan 
the  son  of  Gershom.  He  was  “  before  the  Ark  in  those 
days,”  and  in  the  fierce,  unyielding,  yet  righteous 
desire  for  vengeance  which  animated  the  whole  peo¬ 
ple,  we  seem  to  see  the  same  spirit  which  appeared 
when,  in  the  matter  of  Baal-Peor,  “  Phinehas  arose  and 
“executed  judgment,  and  that  was  counted  unto  him 
“  for  righteousness  among  all  generations  for  ever- 
“  more ;  ”  “  because  he  was  zealous  for  his  God,  and 
“brought  an  atonement  for  the  children  of  Israel.” 
And  the  sudden  change  of  feeling,  no  less  primitive 
and  natural,  the  return  of  compassion  towards  the 
remnant  of  the  Benjamites,  is  still  in  accordance  with 
the  only  other  trait  which  we  know  of  the  character 
of  the  aged  Priest.  They  wept  sore  and  said,  “  0  Lord 
“  God  of  Israel,  why  is  this  come  to  pass  in  Israel  that 
“  there  should  be  to-day  one  tribe  lacking  in  Israel  ? 
“And  the  children  of  Israel  repented  them  for  Ben¬ 
jamin  their  brother.”  Even  so,  when  for  the  fancied 
offence  of  the  Transjordanic  tribes,  the  rest  of  the  na¬ 
tion  with  Phinehas  at  their  head  had  set  off  to  exter- 


Lect.  XIII. 


THE  WAR  OF  BENJAMIN. 


335 


minate  them,  the  same  tender  brotherly  feeling  revived, 
when  the  same  Phinehas  heard  and  accepted  the  ex¬ 
planation  of  the  act.  It  is  the  same  union  of  a  wild 
sense  of  justice  and  religion,  combined  with  a  keen 
sense  of  national  and  family  union,  such  as  marks  an 
early  age,  and  an  early  age  only.  In  the  later  dis¬ 
sensions  of  the  nation,  we  find  no  such  hasty  vows,  no 
such  measures  of  sudden  and  total  destruction.  But 
neither  do  we  find  such  ready  and  eager  forgiveness, 
such  frank  acknowledgment  of  error.  The  early  feuds 
of  nations  and  churches  are  more  violent,  but  they  are 
often  less  inveterate  and  malignant  than  the  sectarian¬ 
ism  and  party-spirit  of  later  years.  The  one  is  a  fit¬ 
ful  frenzy,  the  other  is  a  chronic  disorder.  Doubtless 
there  was  something  fierce  and  terrible  in  the  oracles 
of  the  ancient  Phinehas,  Priest  and  Warrior  in  one ; 
but  he  was  in  the  end  a  milder  counsellor  than  the 
High  Priest  who,  in  the  latest  days  of  the  nation,  in 
all  the  fulness  of  civilization  and  of  statesmanship, 
gave  his  counsel  that  “  it  was  expedient  that  one  man 
should  die  for  the  people,  that  the  whole  nation  perish 
not” 

The  details  of  the  story  agree  with  its  general  char¬ 
acter.  The  resolute  determination  of  the  Benjamites 
not  to  give  up  the  guilty  city  is  a  trait  of  the  bond 
of  honor  and  of  clanship  which,  in  an  early  age,  out¬ 
weighs  the  ties  of  country  and  public  interests.  We 
catch  here,  too,  the  first  glimpse  of  the  romantic,  and, 
as  it  were,  secret  alliance  between  Jabesh-gilead  and 
Benjamin.  Hence  their  absence  from  the  fatal  mas¬ 
sacre  ;  hence  the  chase  of  their  maidens  for  the  future 
wives  of  Benjamin ;  hence,  in  a  later  generation,  their 
application  for  help  to  the  great  chief  of  the  Benja- 
mite  tribe;  hence  their  fidelity  to  him  after  defeat 


336 


ISRAEL  UNDER  THE  JUDGES. 


Lect.  XIII. 


and  death.1  The  remnant  of  the  tribe,  intrenched  on 
the  cliff  of  “  the  Pomegranate,” 2  reveals  to  us  the 
fierce  daring  of  the  time.  The  dances  in  the  vineyards 
of  Shiloh  reveal  to  us  its  simplicity  and  tenderness. 

3.  Thirdly,  the  story  of  Ruth  (in  the  ancient  edi- 
The  story  tions  of  the  Hebrew  Scriptures  always  joined 
in  the  Book  of  Judges)  reveals  to  us  a  scene 
as  primitive  in  its  simple  repose  as  the  others  are  in 
their  violence  and  disorder.3  It  is  one  of  those  quiet 
corners  of  history  which  are  the  green  spots  of  all 
time,  and  which  appear  to  become  greener  and  greener 
as  they  recede  into  the  distance.  Bethlehem  is  the 
starting-point  of  this  story,  as  of  the  two  which  pre¬ 
ceded,  but  now  under  different  auspices.  We  see 
amidst  the  cornfields,  whence  it  derives  its  name, 
“  the  House  of  Bread,”  the  beautiful  stranger  gleaning 
the  ears  of  corn  after  the  reapers.4  We  hear  the  ex¬ 
change  of  salutations  between  the  reapers  and  their 
master;  “Jehovah  be  with  you,”  “Jehovah  bless  thee.”5 
We  are  present  at  the  details  of  the  ancient  custom, 
which  the  author  of  the  book  describes  almost  with 
the  fond  regret  of  modern  antiquarianism,  as  one 
which  was  “the  manner  of  Israel  in  former  times,”  — 
the  symbolical  transference  of  the  rights  of  kinsman- 
ship  by  drawing  off  the  sandal.6  We  have  the  first 
record  of  a  solemn  nuptial  benediction ;  with  the  first 
direct  allusion  to  the  ancient  patriarchal  traditions  of 
Rachel  and  Leah,7  of  Judah  and  Tamar.  And  whilst 


1  Judg.  xxi.  9-14  ;  1  Sam.  xi.  4 ; 
xxxi.  11,  12. 

2  Rimmon;  Judg.  xx.  47. 

3  It  is  useless  (with  so  few  data) 

to  attempt  to  fix  the  exact  time  of 

the  events  related  in  the  Book  of 

Ruth.  Its  general  character,  how¬ 


ever,  agrees  with  the  seclusion  of 
the  tribe  of  Judah  throughout  this 
period. 

4  Ruth  ii.  2. 

5  Ibid.  ii.  4. 

6  Ibid.  iv.  7. 

7  Ibid.  iv.  11,  12. 


Lect.  XIII. 


THE  STORY  OF  RUTH. 


337 


these  touches  send  us  back,  as  in  the  two  dark  stories 
which  precede  this  tranquil  episode,  to  the  earlier  stage 
of  Israelite  existence,  there  is  in  this  the  first  germ 
of  the  future  hope  of  the  nation.  The  book  of  Ruth 
is,  indeed,  the  link  of  connection  between  the  old  and 
the  new.  There  was  rejoicing  over  the  birth  of  the 
child  at  Bethlehem  which  Ruth  bare  to  Boaz :  u  and 
“  Naomi  took  the  child  and  laid  it  in  her  bosom,  and 
“  became  nurse  to  it.” 1  It  would  seem  as  if  there 
was  already  a  kind  of  joyous  foretaste  of  the  birth 
and  infancy  which,  in  after-times,  was  to  be  forever 
associated  with  the  name  of  Bethlehem.  It  was  the 
first  appearance  on  the  scene  of  what  may  by  antici¬ 
pation  be  called  even  then  the  Holy  Family,  for  that 
child  wras  Obed,  the  father  of  Jesse,  the  father  of 
David.  Nor  is  it  a  mere  genealogical  connection  be¬ 
tween  the  two  generations.  The  very  license  and  in¬ 
dependence  of  the  age  may  be  said  to  have  been  the 
means  of  introducing  into  the  ancestry  of  David  and 
of  the  Messiah  an  element  which  else  would  have 
been,  humanly  speaking,  impossible.  “  An  Ammonite 
“  or  a  Moabite  shall  not  enter  into  the  congregation.” 2 
This  was  the  letter  of  the  law,  and  in  the  greater 
strictness  that  prevailed  after  the  return  from  the 
captivity,  it  was  rigidly  enforced.  But  in  the  isolation 
of  Judah  from  the  rest  of  Israel,  in  the  doing  of 
every  man  what  was  right  in  his  own  eyes,  the  more 
comprehensive  spirit  of  the  whole  religion  overstepped 
the  letter  of  a  particular  enactment.  The  story  of 
Ruth  has  shed  a  peaceful  light  over  what  else  would 
be  the  accursed  race  of  Moab.  We  strain  our  gaze 
to  know  something  of  the  long  line  of  the  purple 
hills  of  Moab,  which  form  the  background  at  once  of 

1  Ruth  iv.  16.  2  Deut.  xxiii.  3  ;  Ezra  ix.  1 ;  Neh.  xiii.  1. 

43 


338 


ISRAEL  UNDER  THE  JUDGES. 


Lect.  XIIL 


the  history  and  of  the  geography  of  Palestine.  It  is 
a  satisfaction  to  feel  that  there  is  one  tender  associa¬ 
tion  which  unites  them  with  the  familiar  history  and 
scenery  of  J udsea,  —  that  from  their  recesses,  across  the 
deep  gulf  which  separates  the  two  regions,  came  the 
gentle  ancestress  of  David  and  of  the  Messiah. 

V.  “And  now”  (if  I  may  venture  for  a  moment  to 
use  the  language  of  the  sacred  book1  which  in  the 
New  Testament  has  thrown  itself  with  the  greatest  ar¬ 
dor  and  sympathy  into  this  troubled  period),  “  what 
“  shall  I  more  say  ?  for  the  time  would  fail  me  to  tell 
“  of  Gideon  and  of  Barak,  and  of  Samson  and  of  Jeph- 
“  thah.” 

Deserving  the  details,  let  me  say  thus  much  by 
Mixed  char-  way  of  prelude  to  all  these  characters.  I  have 

acters  of  ^  ^ 

the  period,  dwelt  on  the  unsettled,  transitory,  unequal 
state  of  the  time  in  which  they  lived,  because  only 
in  the  light  of  that  time  can  they  be  fairly  considered. 
Mixed  characters  they  are,  as  almost  all  the  charac¬ 
ters  in  Scripture  are  —  but  in  them  the  ingredients 
are  mixed  more  closely,  more  strongly  than  in  any 
others,  in  proportion  to  the  mixed  character  of  the 
period  which  produced  them.  It  is  this  which  gives 
to  the  narrative  of  the  Book  of  Judges  its  peculiar 
charm.  And,  although  as  I  have  said,  it  stands,  by 
its  own  confession,  on  a  lower  moral  level  than  other 
portions  of  the  Sacred  record,  although  it  portrays  a 
time  when  “  every  man  did  what  was  right  in  his 
“  own  eyes,”  and  when  “  the  children  of  Israel  did 
66  that  which  was  evil  in  the  sight  of  the  Lord,”  yet 
there  is  in  this  very  circumstance  a  lesson  which  we 
should  sorely  miss  if  it  were  lost  to  us.  It  represents 
a  period  of  ecclesiastical  history,  with  all  the  check- 

1  Heb.  xi.  32. 


Lect.  XIII. 


ITS  MIXED  CHARACTERS. 


339 


ered  colors  of  real  life.  It  gives  a  play  to  those  nat¬ 
ural  qualities  which,  though  not  strictly  religious,  are 
yet  too  noble,  too  lively,  too  attractive,  to  be  over¬ 
looked  in  any  true,  and  therefore  (in  the  highest 
sense)  any  religious  view  of  the  world.  We  cannot 
pretend  to  say  that  Samson  and  Jephthah,  hardly 
that  Gideon  or  Barak,  are  characters  which  we  should 
have  selected  as  devout  men,  as  servants  of  God.  We 
should,  at  least  if  we  had  met  with  them  in  another 
history,  have  regarded  them  as  wild  freebooters,  as 
stern  chieftains,  at  best  as  high-minded  patriots.  They 
are  bursting  with  passion,  they  are  stained  by  revenge, 
they  are  alternately  lax  and  superstitious.  Their  vir¬ 
tues  are  of  the  rough  kind,  which  make  them  sub¬ 
jects  of  personal  or  poetic  interest  rather  than  of 
sober  edification  ;  their  words  are  remarkable,  not  so 
much  for  devotion  or  wisdom,  as  for  a  burning  en¬ 
thusiasm,  like  the  song  of  Deborah;  for  a  chivalrous 
frankness,  as  in  the  acts  of  Phinehas  and  of  Jephthah ; 
for  a  ready  presence  of  mind,  as  in  the  movements 
of  Gideon ;  for  a  primitive  and  racy  humor,  as  in  the 
repartees  of  Samson.  Yet  these  characters  are  with¬ 
out  hesitation  ranked  amongst  the  lights  of  the  Chosen 
People :  the  world’s  heroes  are  fearlessly  enrolled 
amongst  God’s  heroes ;  the  men  in  whom  we  should 
be  inclined  to  recognize  only  the  strong  arm  which 
defends  us,  and  the  rough  wit  which  amuses  us, — 
are  described  as  “  raised  up  by  God.”  No  modern 
theory  of  “  inspiration  ”  checks  the  sacred  writers  in 
speaking  of  “  the  Spirit  of  the  Lord  ”  as  “  clothing  ” 
Gideon 1  as  with  a  mantle  for  his  enterprise,  as  66  de¬ 
scending”2  upon  Othniel  and  Jephthah  for  their  wars, 
as  “  striking  ”  the  soul  of  Samson  like  a  bell  or  drum,3 

1  Judg.  vi.  34  (Hebrew).  3  Judg.  xiii.  25  (Hebrew). 

2  Ibid.  iii.  10;  xi.  29. 


340 


ISRAEL  UNDER  THE  JUDGES. 


Lect.  XIII 


or  as  “  rushing  ”  upon  him  with  irresistible  force  for 
his  heroic  deeds.1  In  a  lower  degree,  doubtless,  and 
mingled  with  many  infirmities,  the  wild  chiefs  of  this 
stormy  epoch,  with  their  Phoenician  titles,  their  Bed¬ 
ouin  lives,  and  their  “  muscular  ”  religion,  partook  of 
the  same  Spirit  which  inspired  Moses  and  Joshua  be¬ 
fore  them,  and  David  and  Isaiah  after  them.  The 
imperfection  of  their  characters,  the  disorder  of  their 
times,  set  forth  the  more  clearly  the  one  redeeming 
element  of  trust  in  God  that  lurked  in  each  of  them, 
and,  through  them,  kept  alive  the  national  existence. 
“  By  faith ,”  as  the  author  of  the  Epistle  to  the  He¬ 
brews  is  not  afraid  to  say,  they,  too,  in  their  uncon¬ 
scious  energy  “  subdued  kingdoms  ....  obtained 
“promises,  stopped  the  mouths  of  lions  ....  es- 
“  caped  the  edge  of  the  sword,  out  of  weakness  were 
“  made  strong,  waxed  valiant  in  fight,  turned  to  flight 
“  the  armies  of  the  aliens.” 

Such  an  acknowledgment  of  these  characters  is  a 
double  boon.  Nothing  should  be  lamented,  nothing 
should  be  despised,  which  brings  within  the  range  of 
our  religious  sympathy,  within  the  sanction  of  Reve¬ 
lation,  qualities  and  incidents  which  in  common  life 
we  cannot  help  admiring,  which  history  and  common 
sense  command  us  to  admire,  but  which  yet,  from  our 
narrow  construction  of  God’s  Providence,  we  are  afraid 
to  recognize  in  our  theological  or  ecclesiastical  systems. 
We  gain  by  being  made  at  one  with  ourselves :  Scrip¬ 
ture  gains  by  being  made  at  one  with  us.  Had  the 
history  of  the  Chosen  People  been  framed  on  the 
principle  of  many  a  later  history  of  the  Church,  who 
can  doubt  that  these  inestimable  touches  of  human 
life  and  character  would  have  been  altogether  lost  to 

1  Judg.  xiv.  6 ;  xv.  14. 


Lect.  XIII. 


ITS  CLASSICAL  ELEMENT. 


34i 


us  ?  How  would  Samson  have  fared  with  Milner  ?  to 
what  would  Deborah  have  been  reduced  in  the  refined 
speculations  of  Neander  ? 

And  there  is  a  yet  further  affinity  between  us  and 
them,  which  the  Sacred  history  impresses  upon  The  classi_ 
us.  Is  it  not  the  case  that,  in  this  period,  we  f^the  his-1 
see  for  the  first  time,  and  more  distinctly  than  tory* 
elsewhere,  that  approximation  which  is  developed,  ir¬ 
regularly,  obscurely,  but  still  perceptibly,  as  time  goes 
on,  between  some  elements  of  the  Hebrew  character 
and  those  of  the  western  and  European  world  ?  It  is 
a  matter  which  must  be  stated  carefully  and  cautiously, 
lest  we  seem  to  encourage  the  extravagant  theories 
which,  on  the  right  hand  and  on  the  left,  have  beset 
every  such  view  of  the  question.  But  the  very  fact 
of  such  theories  having  arisen  implies  a  common 
ground,  which  is  really  a  matter  of  solid  interest  and 
instruction.  Few,  if  any,  will  now  maintain  the  hy¬ 
pothesis  of  our  old  divines  of  the  last  century,  that  the 
stories  of  Iphigenia  and  Idomeneus  are  stolen  from  the 
story  of  Jephthah’s  daughter,  or  the  labors  of  Hercules 
from  the  labors  of  Samson  ;  few,  if  any,  will  now  main¬ 
tain,  with  some  Germans  of  the  last  generation,  the 
reverse  hypothesis  that  Samson  and  Jephthah  are 
mere  copies  of  Hercules  and  Agamemnon.  But  the 
resemblance  between  the  two  sets  of  incidents  is  an 
undoubted  indication  that  there  was  something  in  the 
Hebrew  race  which  did  more  readily  produce  incidents 
and  characters,  if  we  may  use  the  expression,  of  a 
classical,  western,  Grecian  type,  than  we  find  in  any 
other  branch  of  the  Semitic,  we  might  almost  add,  of 
the  Oriental  world.  It  is  a  likeness,  which,  as  I  have 
said,  goes  on  increasing  from  this  time  forward.  It 
is  as  if,  from  the  moment  that  the  tribes  of  Israel 


342 


ISRAEL  UNDER  THE  JUDGES. 


Lect.  XIII 


caught  sight  of  the  Mediterranean  waters,  —  of  the 
ships  of  Chittim,  —  of  the  isles  of  the  sea,  —  the  spirit 
of  the  West  began  to  be  mingled  with  the  spirit  of 
their  native  East,  and  they  began  to  assume  that 
position  in  the  world  which  none  have  occupied 
except  the  inhabitants  of  Palestine,  —  links  between 
Asia  and  Europe,  between  Shem  and  Japhet,  be¬ 
tween  the  immovable  repose  of  the  Oriental,  and 
the  endless  activity  and  freedom  of  the  Occidental 
world. 

We  may,  as  we  read  the  story  of  the  Judges,  feel 
that  the  sacred  characters  are  gradually  drawing 
nearer  to  us,  flesh  of  our  flesh,  and  bone  of  our  bone. 
The  figures  of  speech  which  they  use  are  familiar  to 
us  in  the  imagery  of  our  own  West.  In  the  parable 
of  Jotham  —  the  earliest  known  fable  —  we  fall  upon 
the  first  instance  of  that  peculiar  kind  of  composition, 
in  which  the  Eastern  and  Western  imagination  coin¬ 
cide.  The  fables  of  iEsop  are  alike  Grecian  and  Indian. 
The  fable  of  Jotham  might,  as  far  as  its  spirit  goes, 
have  been  spoken  in  the  market-place  of  Athens  or 
of  Pome  as  appropriately  as  on  the  height  of  Gerizim. 
Of  the  classical  elements  in  the  stories  of  Jephthah 
and  Samson  we  shall  have  to  speak  in  detail.  In  the 
case  of  Samson  especially,  the  classical  tendency  has 
been  put  to  the  severest  conceivable  test,  for  it  has 
been  chosen  by  the  most  classical  of  all  English  poets 
as  the  framework  of  a  drama,  which,  even  after 
all  that  has  been  done  since  in  our  own  day  for  fin¬ 
ished  imitations  of  the  Grecian  style,  with  Grecian 
scenery  and  Grecian  mythology  for  their  basis,  must 
yet  be  considered  the  most  perfect  likeness  of 
an  ancient  tragedy  that  modern  literature  has  pro¬ 
duced. 


Lect.  XIII. 


ANALOGY  TO  THE  MIDDLE  AGES. 


343 


YI.  Finally,  there  is,  perhaps,  no  period  of  the  Jew¬ 
ish  history  which  so  directly  illustrates  a  cor-  Analogy  of 

i  •  •  j  p  •  j*  i  •  i  Tl*  period 

responding  period  oi  Christian  history.  It  is,  to  the 
no  doubt,  a  grave  error,  both  in  taste  and  in  Ages, 
religion,  to  institute  a  too  close  comparison  between 
sacred  history  and  common  history.  There  is  a  bar¬ 
rier  between  them  which,  with  all  their  points  of 
resemblance,  cannot  he  overleaped.  But  we  are  ex¬ 
pressly  told  that  the  things  which  “  were  written 
66  aforetime  ”  “  happened  to  them  for  ensamples,”  that 
they  were  “  written  for  our  admonition,  upon  whom 
“  the  ends  of  the  world  are  come.”  If  so,  we  cannot 
safely  decline  to  recognize  the  undoubted  likenesses 
of  ourselves  and  of  our  forefathers  which  those  ex¬ 
amples  contain.  And,  in  this  case,  I  know  not  where 
we  shall  find  a  better  guide  to  conduct  us,  with  a 
judgment  at  once  just  and  tender,  through  the  med¬ 
iaeval  portion  of  Christian  ecclesiastical  history,  than 
the  sacred  record  of  the  corresponding  period  of  the 
history  of  the  Judges.  The  knowledge  of  each  period 
reacts  upon  our  knowledge  of  the  other.  The  diffi¬ 
culties  of  each  mutually  explain  the  other.  We  can¬ 
not  be  in  a  better  position  for  defending  mediaeval 
Christianity  against  the  indiscriminate  attacks  of  one¬ 
sided  Puritanical  writers,  than  by  pointing  to  its  coun¬ 
terpart  in  the  Sacred  record.  We  cannot  wish  for  a 
better  proof  of  the  general  truth  and  fidelity  of  this 
part  of  the  Biblical  narrative,  than  by  observing  its 
exact  accordance  with  the  manners  and  feelings  of 
Christendom  under  analogous  circumstances.  We  need 
only  claim  for  the  doubtful  acts  of  Jephthah  and  of 
Jael  the  same  verdict  -that  philosophical  historians 
have  pronounced  on  the  like  actions  of  Popes  and 
Crusaders,  —  a  judgment  to  be  measured  not  by  our 


344 


THE  PERIOD  OF  THE  JUDGES. 


Lect.  XIIL 


age,  but  by  theirs,  not  by  the  light  of  full  Christian 
civilization,  but  by  the  license  of  a  time  when  “  every 
“  man  did  what  was  right  in  his  own  eyes,” —  and 
when  the  maxim  of  them  of  old  time  still  prevailed 
over  every  other  consideration,  —  “  Thou  shalt  love 
“  thy  neighbor,  and  hate  thine  enemy”  We  need  only 
claim  for  the  Middle  Ages  the  same  favorable  hearing 
which  religious  men  of  all  persuasions  are  willing  to 
extend  to  the  Judges  of  Israel.  The  difficulty  which 
uneducated  or  half-educated  classes  of  men  find  in 
rightly  judging,  or  even  rightly  conceiving,  of  a  state 
of  morals  and  religion  different  from  their  own,  is  one 
of  the  main  obstacles  to  a  general  diffusion  of  com¬ 
prehensive  and  tolerant  views  of  past  history.  What 
we  want  is  some  common  ground,  on  which  the  poor 
and  unlearned  can  witness  the  application  of  such 
views  no  less  than  the  highly  cultivated.  Such  a 
ground  is  furnished  by  many  parts  of  the  sacred  nar¬ 
rative  ;  but  by  none  so  much  as  the  Book  of  Judges. 
If  we  urge  that  the  Middle  Ages  must  be  judged  by  an¬ 
other  standard  than  our  own ;  that  the  excesses  which 
are  now  universallv  condemned  were  then  united  with 

1/ 

high  and  noble  aspirations ;  to  half  the  world  we  shall 
be  saying  words  without  meaning.  But  if  we  can 
show  that  the  very  same  variation  of  judgment  is  al¬ 
lowed  and  enforced  in  the  sacred  and  familiar  instance 
of  the  Judges,  we  shall,  at  any  rate,  have  a  chance  of 
being  heard.  Here,  as  elsewhere,  the  Bible  will  dis¬ 
charge  its  proper  function  of  being  the  one  book  of  all 
classes,  —  the  one  history  and  literature  in  which  rich 
and  poor  can  meet  together  and  understand  each  other. 

These  resemblances  between  the  mediaeval  history 
of  the  Jewish  Church  and  the  mediaeval  history  of 
the  Christian  Church  are  seen  at  every  turn,  and 


Lect.  XIII.  ANALOGY  TO  THE  MIDDLE  AGES.  345 

perhaps  more  felt  than  seen.  Take  any  scene,  almost 
at  random,  from  this  period ;  and,  but  for  the  names 
and  Eastern  coloring,  it  might  be  from  the  tenth  or 
twelfth  century.  The  house  of  Micah  and  his  Levite 
set  forth  the  exact  likeness  of  the  feudal  castle  and 
feudal  chieftain  of  our  early  civilization.  The  Danites, ' 
eager  to  secure  to  their  enterprise  the  sanction  of  a 
sacred  personage  and  of  sacred  images,  are  the  fore¬ 
runners  of  that  strange  mixture  of  faith  and  super¬ 
stition,  which  prompted  in  the  Middle  Ages  so  many 
pious  thefts  of  relics,  so  many  extortions  of  unwilling 
benedictions.  The  Levite  bribed  by  the  promise  of 
a  higher  office  is,  as  we  have  already  observed,  the 
likeness  of  the  faithless  guardian  of  a  venerated  shrine 
tempted  by  the  vacant  Abbacy  in  some  neighboring 
monastery  to  betray  the  sacred  treasure  committed 
to  him.  In  Micah  and  his  armed  men  pursuing  their 
lost  teraphim,  and  repulsed  with  rough  taunts  by  the 
stronger  band,  we  read  the  victory  obtained  by  the  suc¬ 
cessful  relic-stealers  over  their  less  ready  or  less  pow¬ 
erful  rivals.  The  whole  story  of  the  Benjamite  war 
has  been  introduced  as  a  mediaeval  tale  into  a  cele¬ 
brated  historical  romance,1  perhaps  with  questionable 
propriety,  but  in  such  exact  conformity  to  the  cos¬ 
tume  and  fashion  of  the  time,  as  to  furnish  of  itself 
a  proof  of  the  graphic  faithfulness  of  the  sacred  nar¬ 
rative,  which  could  lend  itself  so  readily  to  the  meta¬ 
morphosis.  The  summons  of  the  tribes  by  the  bones 
of  the  murdered  victim,  and  of  the  slaughtered  ani¬ 
mal,  is  the  same  as  the  summons  of  the  Highland 
clans  by  the  fiery  cross  dipped  in  blood.  The  vows 
of  monastic  life,  the  vows  of  celibacy,  the  vows  of 
pilgrimage,  which  exercise  so  large  an  influence  over 

1  See  Scott’s  Ivanhoe ,  c.  xv. 


44 


346 


THE  PERIOD  OF  THE  JUDGES. 


Lect.  XIII 


mediaeval  life,  have  their  prototypes  in  the  vows  ah 
ready  noticed  in  the  early  struggles  of  Israel  —  the 
same  excuses,  the  same  evils,  and  many  of  the  same 
advantages.  The  insecurity  of  communication  —  the 
danger  of  violence  by  night  —  is  the  same  in  both 
periods.  The  very  roads  fall,  if  one  may  so  say,  into 
the  same  track.  “The  highways  become  unoccupied, 
and  the  travellers,”  alike  in  Judaea  and  in  England, 
“  walk  along  the  by-ways,” 1  under  the  skirt  of  the 
hills  and  through  the  dark  lanes  which  may  screen 
them  from  notice.  We  are  struck  at  Ascalon  and  in 
the  plains  of  Philistia  by  finding  the  localities  equally 
connected  with  the  history  of  Richard  Coeur-de-Lion 
and  of  Samson ;  but  they  are,  in  fact,  united  by  moral 
and  historical,  far  more  than  by  any  mere  local,  coin¬ 
cidences.  In  both  ages  there  is  the  same  long  cru¬ 
sade  against  the  unbelievers.  The  Moors  in  Spain, 
the  Tartars  in  Russia,  play  the  very  same  part  as  the 
Canaanites  and  Philistines  in  Palestine.  The  caves  of 
Palestine  furnish  the  same  refuge  as  the  caves  of  As¬ 
turias.  Priests  anti  Levites  wander  to  and  fro  over 
Palestine :  mendicant  friars  and  sellers  of  indulgences 
over  Europe.  Hophni  and  Phinehas  become  at  Shiloh 
the  prototypes  of  the  bloated  pluralists  of  the  Mediae¬ 
val  Church  of  Europe.  “In  those  days  there  was  no 
king  in  Israel,”  there  was  no  settled  government  in 
Christendom,  —  all  things  were  as  yet  in  chaos  and 
confusion.  Yet  the  germs  of  a  better  life  were 
everywhere  at  work.  In  the  one,  the  Judge,  as  we 
have  seen  was  gradually  blending  into  the  hereditary 
King.  In  the  other,  the  feudal  chief  was  gradually 
passing  into  the  constitutional  sovereign.  The  youth 
of  Samuel,  the  childhood  of  David,  were  nursed  under 

1  Judg.  v.  6. 


i 


Lect.  XIII. 


ANALOGY  TO  THE  MIDDLE  AGES. 


347 


this  wild  system.  The  schools  of  the  prophets,  the 
universities  of  Christendom,  owe  their  first  impulse  to 
this  first  period  of  Jewish  and  of  Christian  History. 

The  age  of  the  Psalmists  and  Prophets  was  an  im¬ 
mense  advance  upon  the  age  of  the  Judges.  Yet  Psalm¬ 
ists  and  Prophets  look  back  with  exultation  and  delight 
to  the  day  when  the  rod  of  the  oppressor  was  broken,1 
when  the  hosts  of  Sisera  perished  at  Endor,  when 
Zeba  and  Zalmunna  were  swept  away  as  the  stubble 
before  the  wind.  Our  age  is  an  immense  advance 
upon  the  age  of  chivalry  and  the  Crusaders;  but  it 
is  well,  from  time  to  time,  to  be  reminded  that  there 
are  virtues  in  chivalry  and  in  barbarism,  as  well  as  in 
reason  and  civilization;  and  the  author  of  the  Epistle 
to  the  Hebrews  has  taught  us  that  even  the  most 
imperfect  of  the  champions  of  ancient  times  may  be 
ranked  in  the  cloud  of  the  witnesses  of  faith, — 
“God  having  provided  some  better  thing  for  us,  that 
“  they  without  us  might  not  be  made  perfect.” 2 


1  Isaiah  ix.  4  ;  x.  26 ;  Ps.  lxxxiii.  9-11. 


2  Heb.  xi.  40. 


348 


DEBORAH. 


Lect.  XIV. 


LECTURE  XIY. 

DEBORAH. 

<• 

The  great  war  of  the  earlier  period  of  the  history 
is  heralded  by  two  or  three  lesser  conflicts. 

Othniel  only  appears  as  the  last  of  the  generation 
othniei.  of  conquerors.1  In  him  the  Lion  of  Judah, 
which  had  won  the  southern  portion  of  Palestine 
under  Caleb,  appears  for  the  last  time,  till  the  resus¬ 
citation  of  the  warlike  spirit  of  the  tribe  by  David. 
All  the  other  indications  of  its  history  during  this 
period  are  peaceful ;  the  pastoral  simplicity  of  Boaz 
and  Ruth,  its  absence  from  the  gathering  under 
Barak,  its  retiring  demeanor  in  the  story  of  Samson. 
The  enemy  whom  Othniel  attacked  is  also  a  solitary 
exception.  Chushan-Rishathaim  is  the  only  invader 
from  the  remote  East  till  the  decline  of  the  mon¬ 
archy,  and  his  name  has  as  yet  received  no  illustra¬ 
tion  from  the  Assyrian  monuments  or  history. 

The  story  of  Ehud  throws  a  broader  light  over  the 
Ehud.  darkness  of  the  time.  The  Moabite  armies,  the 
most  civilized  of  the  Transjordanic  nations,  exasperat¬ 
ed,  perhaps,  by  the  increasing  inroads  of  Gad  and  Reu¬ 
ben,  place  themselves  at  the  head  of  the  more  no¬ 
madic  tribes  of  Ammon  and  Amalek,  cross  the  Jordan, 
and  (like  the  Israelites  on  their  first  passage)  estab¬ 
lish  themselves  at  Gilgal  and  Jericho.  Beyond  the 


Lect.  XIV. 


EHUD. 


349 


mountain  barrier  they  did  not  reach ; 1  but  their  do¬ 
minion  extended  itself  over  the  neighboring  tribe  of 
Benjamin,2  and  a  village  bearing  the  name  of  the 
"hamlet  of  the  Ammonites”3  was  probably  the  me¬ 
morial  of  this  conquest.  From  Benjamin,  accordingly, 
a  yearly  tribute  was  exacted.  There  was  in  the  tribe 
a  youth4  of  the  name  of  Ehud,  who  had  acquired  a 
fame  for  prophetic  power  in  the  country.  He  was 
naturally  intrusted  with  the  charge  of  carrying  the 
tribute  to  the  Moabite  fortress.  After  he  had  de¬ 
livered  the  gifts,  he  paid  a  visit  to  the  sacred  enclos¬ 
ure5  or  "images”  at  Gilgal,  left  his  two  attendants,6 
and  returned,  with  his  increased  knowledge  of  the 
localities,  to  the  presence  of  the  king.  The  whole 
scene  is  full  of  the  contrast  between  the  slight,  wily, 
agile  Israelite,  and  the  corpulent,7  credulous,  unwieldy 
Moabite.  The  king  is  seated  in  a  chamber  on  the 
roof  of  the  house  for  the  sake  of  catching  a  cool  air 
in  the  sultry  atmosphere  of  the  Jordan  valley,  with 
his  attendants  around  him.  Ehud  announces  that  he 
has  a  secret  oracle  to  disclose.  The  king,  with  an 
instantaneous  "  Hush !  ” 8  orders  his  attendants  to  with¬ 
draw.  Ehud,  still  fearing  lest  his  blow  should  miss 
its  aim,  repeats  the  announcement  of  the  divine  mes¬ 
sage.  This  was  to  raise  the  king  from  his  sitting 
posture,  and  expose  him  to  the  stroke  more  easily. 
Eglon  falls  into  the  snare.  With  the  respect  always 
paid  in  the  East  to  a  sacred  personage,  he  rises  and 
comes  towards  the  assassin.  In  that  moment,  from 

1  Judg.  iii.  13.  the  word  translated  “  quarries,”  Judg. 

2  Ibid.  26.  iii.  19,  26. 

3  Josh,  xviii.  24.  6  Joseph.  Ant.  v.  4,  §  2  ;  ovv  dvolv 

4  Joseph,  Ant.  v.  4,  §  2  ;  veavtac,  oIketclls. 

veavloHoq.  7  Judg.  iii.  1 7. 

5  This  seems  to  be  the  meaning  of  8  Ibid.  19  (Hebrew). 


350 


DEBORAH. 


Lect.  XIV 


the  long  mantle,1  which  as  the  leader  of  the  tribe  he 
wore  round  him,  Ehud,  left-handed  like  so  many  of 
his  tribesmen, a  drew  the  long  dagger  concealed  on  his 
right  thigh.  Its  flash3  is  seen  for  an  instant,  before 
the  flesh  of  the  portly  king  closes  in  upon  it.  Ehud 
escapes  by  the  gallery  round  the  roof,  locking  the 
door  behind  him.  He  regains  the  sanctuary  at  Gilgal, 
then  darts  into  the  mountains,  and  rouses  his  coun¬ 
trymen  by  the  rude  blasts  of  his  cow-horns,  blown  in 
every  direction  over  the  hill-side.  The  upper  cham¬ 
ber  at  Jericho,  meanwhile,  remains  shut.  The  attend¬ 
ants  stand  outside.  They  cannot  account  for  the  long 
closing  of  the  door,  except  on  the  supposition  that 
their  lord  had  retired  there  for  purposes  which  Orien¬ 
tal  delicacy  reserves  for  seclusion.  At  last  their  hope 
fails.4  They  find  the  huge  corpse  stretched  on  the 
ground.  They  fly  panic-stricken ;  but,  by  the  time 
they  reach  the  ford  of  the  Jordan,  they  find  it  inter¬ 
cepted  by  the  Israelite  warriors,  and  the  narrative 
ends  as  it  had  begun,  with  its  half-humorous  allusion 
to  the  well-fed 6  carcasses  of  those,  who,  corpulent 
like  their  chief,  lay  dead  along  the  shore  of  the  river. 

But  the  crowning  event  of  this  period,  both  in  its 
Deborah.  intrinsic  interest  and  our  knowledge  of  it,  is 
the  victory  of  Deborah  and  Barak.  It  is  told  both 
in  prose  and  poetry,  and  the  poem  is  one  of  the 
most  incontestable  remains  of  antiquity  that  the  Sa¬ 
cred  records  contain,  and  the  increased  pleasure  and 
instruction  with  which  we  are  enabled  to  read  it 
furnish  a  signal  proof  of  the  gain  added  to  our  Bib¬ 
lical  knowledge  by  the  advance  of  Biblical  criticism. 

1  The  word  translated  “raiment,”  2  Ibid.  xx.  16;  1  Chron.  xii.  2. 
Judg.  iii.  16.  4  Judg.  iii.  25  (Hebrew). 

3  LXX.  tfk by  a.  Comp.  Nahum  iii.  5  Ibid.  29.  The  word  translated 
3 ;  Judg.  iii.  22  ;  Job  xxxix.  23.  “  lusty,”  always  elsewhere  “  fat.” 


7 


/,  Q  w  To  Adsnvud'. 

/u*. 


Mfi  W. 


q551.48  Poland  (1918-  )--Panstwowa  slu2ba 
P75s  hydrograf iazna.  ...  Szczegolowy  pod 

zial  dorzecza  Prypeci  ...  1933. 


(Card  2) 

Pologne. 

Folded  map  in  pocket  on  back 

cover. 

Table  of  contents,  chapter  and  table 
headings  in  Polish  and  French.  French 
summary. 


II IL  34-2102 


Lect.  XIV. 


DEBORAH. 


351 


If,  in  the  story  of  Ehud  and  Eglon,  we  trace  some¬ 
thing  of  what  may  be  called  the  comic  vein  of  the 
Sacred  History,  in  the  story  of  Deborah  and  Sisera 
we  come  across  the  tragic  vein  in  its  grandest  style. 

The  power  of  the  northern  kings,  which  Joshua 
had  broken  down  at  the  waters  of  Merom,  revived 
under  a  second  Jabin,  also  king  of  Hazor.  The  for¬ 
midable  chariots,  as  before,  overran  the  territories  of 
the  adjacent  tribes.  The  wdiole  country  was  disor¬ 
ganized  with  terror.  The  obscure  tortuous  paths  be¬ 
came  the  only  means  of  communication.1  As  long 
afterwards  in  the  time  of  Saul,  regular  weapons  dis¬ 
appeared  from  the  oppressed  population.  “  There  was 
“  not  a  spear  or  shield  seen  among  forty  thousand  in 
“  Israel.”2  Shamgar,  the  son  of  Anath,  defended  him¬ 
self  against  the  enemies  of  the  south  with  a  long  pole 
armed  at  the  end  with  a  spike  still  used  by  the 
peasants  of  Palestine.  In  this  general  depression,  the 
national  spirit  was  revived  by  one  whose  appearance 
is  full  of  significance.  On  the  heights  of  Ephraim,  on 
the  central  thoroughfare  of  Palestine,  near  the  sanc¬ 
tuary  of  Bethel,  stood  two  famous  trees  (if  we  may 
be  permitted  to  distinguish  them),  both  in  after-times 
known  by  the  same  name.  One  was  “the  oak-tree,” 
or  “Terebinth”  “of  Deborah,”  underneath  which  was 
buried,  with  many  tears,  the  nurse  of  Jacob.3  The 
other  was  a  solitary  palm,  which,  in  all  probability, 
had  given  its  name  to  an  adjacent  sanctuary,  Baal- 
Tamar,4  “the  sanctuary  of  the  palm,”  but  which  was 
also  known  in  after-times  as  “the  palm-tree  of  Deb¬ 
orah.”5  Under  this  palm,  as  Saul  afterwards  under 

1  Judg.  v.  5.  4  Judg.  xx.  33. 

2  Ibid.  8.  5  Her  name,  on  which  Josephua 

3  Gen.  xxxiv.  8,  and  possibly  “  the  ( Ant .  v.  5)  lays  stress,  as  the  Sacred 

oak  of  Tabor,”  1  Sam.  x.  3.  Bee  or  “  Queen  Bee  ”  of  Palestine, 


352 


DEBOKAH. 


Lect.  XIV 


the  pomegranate-tree  of  Migron,1  as  S.  Louis  under 
the  oak-tree  of  Vincennes,  dwelt  Deborah  the  wife  of 
Lapidoth,  to  whom  the  sons  of  Israel  came  up  to 
receive  her  wise  answers.  She  is  the  magnificent 
impersonation  of  the  free  spirit  of  the  Jewish  peo¬ 
ple  and  of  Jewish  life.  On  the  coins  of  the  Roman 
Empire,  Judaea  is  represented  as  a  woman  seated 
under  a  palm-tree,  captive  and  weeping.  It  is  the 
contrast  of  that  figure  which  will  best  place  before 
us  the  character  and  call  of  Deborah.  It  is  the  same 
Judaean  palm,  under  whose  shadow  she  sits,  but  not 
with  downcast  eyes  and  folded  hands,  and  extin¬ 
guished  hopes;  with  all  the  fire  of  faith  and  energy, 
eager  for  the  battle,  confident  of  the  victory.  Like 
the  German  prophetess  who  roused  her  people  against 
the  invaders  from  Rome,  like  the  simple  peasant-girl, 
who  by  communing  with  mysterious  angels’  voices 
roused  the  French  nation  against  the  English  do¬ 
minion,  when  princes  and  statesmen  had  wellnigh 
given  up  the  cause,  —  so  the  heads  of  Israel  “ceased 
“  and  ceased,  until  that  she,  Deborah,  arose,  that  she 
“  arose,  a  mother  in  Israel.”  Her  appearance  was  like 
a  new  epoch.  They  chose  new  chiefs  that  came  as 
new  gods2  among  them.  It  was  she  who  turned  her 
eyes  and  the  eyes  of  the  nation  to  the  fitting  leader. 
As  always  in  these  wars,  he  was  to  come  from  the 
tribe  that  most  immediately  suffered  from  the  yoke  of 
the  oppressor.  High  up  in  the  north,  almost  within 
sight  of  the  capital  of  Jabin,  was  the  sanctuary  of 
Kedesh-  the  tribe  of  Naphtali,  —  Kedesh-Naphtali.  It 
Naphtah.  *g  a  Sp0^  which,  though  only  mentioned  here 


may  be  perhaps  derived  from  her  Dissertation  on  the  Song  of  Debo- 

patriarchal  namesake,  by  whose  tomb  rah. 

she  sat.  Compare  Donaldson's  Latin  1  1  Sam.  xiv.  2. 

2  Judg.  v.  8. 


( 


Lect.  XIV. 


KEDE  SH-XAPHTALI. 


353 


in  direct  connection  with  the  sacred  history,  retained 
its  sanctity  long  afterwards.1  Planted  on  a  hill  over¬ 
looking  a  double  platform,  or  green  upland  plain, 
amongst  the  mountains  of  Naphtali,  its  site  is  cov¬ 
ered  with  ancient  ruins  beyond  any  other  spot  in 
western  Palestine,  if  we  except  the  ancient  capitals 
of  Hebron,  Jerusalem,  and  Samaria.  Tombs  of  every 
kind,  rock-hewn  caves,  stone  coffins  thrust  into  the 
earth,  elaborate  mausoleums,  indicate  the  reverence 
in  which  it  must  have  been  held  by  successive  gen¬ 
erations  of  the  Jewish  people.  In  this  remote  sanc¬ 
tuary  lived  a  chief,  who  bore  the  significant  name 
—  which  afterwards  reappears  amongst  the  warriors 
of  Carthage  — -  “  Barak  ”  —  “  Barca  ”  —  “  Lightning.” 2 
His  fame  must  have  been  wide-spread  to  have  reached 
the  prophetess  in  her  remote  dwelling  at  Bethel. 
From  his  native  place  she  summoned  him  to  her 
side,  and  delivered  to  him  her  prophetic  command. 
He,  as  if  oppressed  by  the  presence  of  a  loftier  spirit 
than  his  own,  refuses  to  act,  unless  she  were  with 
him  to  guide  his  movements,  and  (according  to  the 
Septuagint  version)  to  name  the  very  day  which 
should  be  auspicious  for  his  effort :  “  For  I  know  not 
“  the  day  on  which  the  Lord  will  send  his  good  angel 
“with  me.”3  She  replies  at  once  with  the  Hebrew 
emphasis:  “I  will  go,  I  will  go!”  but  adding  the  res¬ 
ervation,  that  the  honor  should  not  rest  with  the 
man  who  thus  leaned  upon  a  woman,  but  that  a 
woman  should  reap  the  glory  of  the  day  of  which  a 
woman  had  been  the  adviser.  It  was  from  Kedesh 

1  It  is  described  in  Robinson,  iii.  appears  in  the  present  text  is  still 

367.  I  saw  it  in  1862.  more  thoroughly  brought  out  in  Jose- 

2  Joseph.  (Ant.  v.  5,  §  2)  dwells  phus,  Ant.  v.  5,  §  3.  The  emphasis  is 

on  this.  on  “  thou.”  —  “  The  way  which  thou 

3  Judg.  iv.  9.  The  ambiguity  which  goest.” 

45 


354 


DEBORAH. 


Lect.  XIV. 


that  the  insurrection,  thus  organized,  spread  from 
The  tribe  to  tribe.  The  temperature  of  the  zeal 
fhehtribes.°  of  the  different  portions  of  the  nation  can  be 
traced  almost  in  proportion  to  their  nearness  to  the 
centre  of  the  agitation.  The  main  support  of  the 
cause  was  naturally  derived  from  the  northern  tribes, 
who  were  the  chief  sufferers  from  the  oppressor,  and 
who  fell  most  immediately  within  the  range  of  Barak’s 
influence.  The  leading  tribe,  conjointly  with  Barak’s 
own  clan  of  Naphtali,  but  even  more  conspicuously, 
was  Zebulun,1  as  though  the  spirit  of  the  neighboring 
population  was  less  crushed  than  that  which  lay  close 
under  the  walls  of  Jabin’s  capital.  The  sceptres  or 
standards  of  Zebulun  stamped  themselves  on  the 
mind  of  the  beholders,  as  the  two  kindred  tribes, 
drew  near  to  “  the  high  places  of  the  field  ” 2  of  the 
upland  plain  of  Kedesh,  ready  “to  throw”  their  lives 
headlong  into  the  mortal  struggle.  With  them,  but 
in  a  subordinate  place,  were  the  chiefs  of  Issachar,3 
roused  apparently  by  Deborah  herself,  as  she  passed 
over  the  plain  of  Esdraelon  on  her  way  to  Kedesh. 
To  her  influence  also  must  be  ascribed  the  rising  of 
the  central  tribes  around  her  residence  at  Bethel. 
From  the  mountain  which  bore  the  name  of  Amalek 
came  a  band  of  Ephraimites.  The  war-cry  of  Benja¬ 
min,  “After  thee,  Benjamin!”4  was  raised,  and  from 
the  north-eastern  portion  of  Manasseh  came  repre¬ 
sentatives  bearing  some  high  title,  which  distinguished 
them  from  the  surrounding  chiefs.5 

of  iv.  14  with  ver.  10,  rather  favors 
the  former.  The  Vulgate  translates 
it  in  regione  Merom. 

3  Judg.  v.  15. 

4  Ibid"  14. 

5  Ibid.  14,  (Hebrew). 


1  The  two  occur  together,  Judg.  iv. 
10;  v.  18;  but  Zebulun  first;  and 
Zebulun  also  appears  in  chap.  v.  14. 

2  Judg.  v.  18.  The  “  high  places  of 
the  field,”  here  more  especially  asso¬ 
ciated  with  Naphtali,  may  be  either 
Kedesh  or  Tabor.  The  comparison 


Lect.  XIV. 


THE  GATHERING  OF  THE  TRIBES. 


355 


Three  portions  of  the  nation  remained  aloof.  Of 
Judah  nothing  is  said.  Dan  and  Asher,  the  two  mari¬ 
time  tribes,  clung  the  one  to  his  ships  in  the  harbor 
of  Joppa,  the  other  to  his  sea-shore  by  the  bay  of 
Acre.  The  Transjordanic  tribes  met  by  one  of  the 
rushing  streams  of  their  native  hills  —  the  Arnon  or 
the  Jabbok  —  to  decide  on  their  course.  “  Great  was 
the  debate.”  The  pastoral  Reuben  preferred  to  linger 
among  the  sheepfolds,  among  the  whistling  pipes  of 
the  shepherds.1  “  Great  was  the  wavering  ”  that  fol¬ 
lowed.  And  the  nomadic  Gileadites  abode  in  their 
tents  or  their  cities,  safe  beyond  the  Jordan  valley. 

These,  however,  were  exceptions.  It  was  a  general 
revival  of  the  national  spirit,  such  as  rarely  occurred. 
The  leaders  are  described  as  filling  their  places  with 
an  ardor  worthy  of  their  position.  “  The  chiefs  be- 
came  the  chiefs,”  in  deed,2  as  well  as  in  name. 
u  The  lawgivers  of  Israel  willingly  offered  themselves 
“  for  the  people.” 3  “  The  Lord  came  down  amongst 

“  the  mighty.”  And  to  this  the  nation  responded  with 
a  readiness,  unlike  their  usual  sluggishness,  as  under 
Gideon  and  Saul.  “  The  people  willingly  offered  them- 
u  selves.” 4  u  They  that  rode  on  white  asses,  they  that 
“  sate  on  rich  carpets  of  state,  they  that  humbly 
“  walked  by  the  way,”5  all  joined  in  this  solemn  en¬ 
terprise. 

The  muster-place  was  Mount  Tabor.  The  marked 
isolation  of  the  mountain,  the  broad  green-  The  meet 
sward  on  its  summit,  possibly  the  first  begin-  j”gu°“ 
nings  of  the  fortress  which  crowned  its  height  Tabor* 

1  See  Ewald,  iii.  88  note.  “  On  2  Judg.  v.  15,  16  (Hebrew). 

Lebanon  we  met  a  troop  of  goats,  the  3  Ibid.  9,  13  (Hebrew), 

goatherds  singing  in  chorus  to  the  4  Ibid.  2. 
music  of  a  well-played  reed-pipe.”  5  Ibid.  10 
(Miss  Beaufort’s  Travels ,  i.  283.) 


356 


DEBOKAH. 


Lect.  XIV 


in  later  times,  pointed  it  out  as  the  encampment  of 
the  northern  tribes,  in  the  centre  of  which  it  stood. 
It  has  been  already  noticed  that,  in  all  probability, 
this  was  the  mountain  to  which  the  people  of  “  Zebu- 
lun  and  Issachar  ”  are  called  by  Moses  “  to  offer  sac¬ 
rifices  of  righteousness.”1  There  two  at  least  of  the 
tribes,  Zebulun  and  Naphtali,  waited  under  their  leaders 
for  the  appearance  of  the  enemy.  A  village  on  the 
wooded  slope  of  the  hill  still  bears  the  name  of  Debo¬ 
rah,  possibly  from  this  connection  with  her  history. 

The  enemy  were  not  without  tidings  of  the  insur¬ 
rection.  Close  beside  Kedesh-Naphtali  was  a  tribe, 
hovering  between  Israel  and  Canaan,  which  we  shall 
shortly  meet  again,  through  which  (so  we  are  led  to 
infer 2)  this  information  came.  From  Harosheth  of  the 
Gentiles  —  the  “  woodcuttings  ”  or  “  quarries  ”  of  the 
mixed  heathen  population  on  the  outskirts  of  Lebanon 
—  came  down  the  Canaanite  host,  with  the  chariots 
of  iron,  in  which,  after  the  manner  of  their  country¬ 
men,  they  trusted  as  invincible.  Their  leader,  the  first, 
indeed  the  only,  commander  of  whom  we  hear  by 
name  on  the  adverse  side  of  these  long  wars,  was 
himself  a  native  of  Harosheth,  and  a  potentate  of  suf¬ 
ficient  grandeur  to  have  his  mother  recognized  in  the 
surrounding  tribes  as  a  kind  of  queen-mother  of  the 
place;  and  whose  family  traditions  had  struck  such 
root,  that  the  name  of  “Sisera”  occurs  long  after¬ 
wards  in  the  history,  and  the  great  Jewish  Rabbi 
Akiba3  claimed  to  be  descended  from  him.  Jabin 
himself  seems  not  to  have  been  present.  But,  as 
in  the  former  battle  by  the  waters  of  Merom,  so  now, 
several  kings  of  the  Canaanites  had  joined  him;4  and 

1  Deut.  xxxiii.  19.  2  Judg.  iv.  n. 

3  See  Milman’s  Hist,  of  the  Jews,  4  Judg.  v.  3,  19. 


Lect.  XIV. 


BATTLE  OF  MEGIDDO. 


357 


they,  with  all  their  forces,  encamped  in  the  plain  of 
Esdraelon,  now  for  the  first  time  the  battle-field  of 
Israel,  where  their  chariots  and  cavalry  could  act 
most  effectively.  They  took  up  their  position  in  the 
south-west  corner  of  the  plain,  where  a  long  spur,  now 
clad  with  olives,  runs  out  from  the  hills  of  Manasseh 
On  this  promontory  still  stands  a  large  stone  village, 
in  its  name  of  Taanak,1  marking  the  site  of  Taanach. 
the  Canaanitish  fortress  of  Taanach,  beside  which, 
doubtless,  as  occupied  by  a  kindred  unconquered  pop¬ 
ulation,  the  Canaanite  kings  were  intrenched.  It  is 
just  at  this  point  that  the  traveller  catches  the  first 
distinct  view  of  the  arched  summit  of  Tabor.  From 
that  summit  Deborah  must  have  watched  the  gradual 
drawing  of  the  enemy  towards  the  spot  of  her  pre¬ 
dicted  triumph.  She  raised  the  cry,  which  twice  over 
occurs  in  the  story  of  the  battle,  “  Arise,  Barak.”2 
She  gave  with  unhesitating  confidence  to  the  doubl¬ 
ing  troops  the  augury  which  he  had  asked  before  the 
insurrection  began,  —  “  This”  this  and  no  other,  “  is 
the  day  when  the  Lord  shall  deliver  Sisera  into  thy 
hand.”3  Down  from  the  wooded  heights  descended 
Barak  and  his  ten  thousand  men.  It  is  emphatically 
repeated  that  they  were  “  on  foot,” 4  and  thus  contrast¬ 
ed  in  the  most  forcible  manner  with  the  horses  and 
chariots  of  their  enemies. 

From  Tabor  to  Taanach  is  a  march  of  about  thir¬ 
teen  miles,  and  therefore  the  approach  must  have  been 
long  foreseen  by  the  Canaanitish  forces.  They  moved 
westwards  along  the  plain,  which  here  forms,  as  it 
were,  a  large  bay  to  the  south,  between  the  projecting 

1  Judg.  i.  27  ;  v.  19.  2  Ibid.  iv.  14  (Hebrew) ;  v.  12. 

3  Ibid.  iv.  8  (LXX.).  14 ;  Joseph.  4  Ibid.  iv.  10 ;  v.  15. 

Ant.  v.  5,  §  3. 


358 


DEBORAH. 


Lect.  XIY. 


promontory  of  Taanach  and  the  first  beginnings  of 
Carmel.  The  plain  is  luxuriant  with  weeds  and  corn. 
One  solitary  tree  rises  from  the  midst  of  it.  The  great 
caravan  route  from  Damascus  to  Egypt  passes,  and 
probably  at  that  time  already  passed,  across  it.  At  the 
head  of  this  curve  stood  another  unsubdued  Canaanitish 

The  waters  fortress,  Megiddo,  afterwards  the  station  of  a 
of Megiddo.  Roman  “Legion,”  whence  its  present  name,  Led- 

jun.  Towards  the  cover  of  this,  it  may  be,  securer  fast¬ 
ness,  hut  still  keeping  along  the  level  plain,  the  Canaan¬ 
itish  army  moved.  Its  final  encampment  was  beside  the 
numerous  rivulets  which,  descending  from  the  hills  of 
Megiddo  into  the  Kishon,  as  it  flows  in  a  broader  stream 
through  the  cornfields  below,  may  well  have  been  known 
as  “  the  waters  of  Megiddo.” 1  It  was  at  this  critical 
moment  that  (as  we  learn  directly  from  Josephus,2  and 
indirectly  from  the  song  of  Deborah)  a  tremendous  storm 
of  sleet  and  hail  gathered  from  the  east,  and  burst 
over  the  plain,  driving  full  in  the  faces  of  the  advan¬ 
cing  Canaanites.  “  The  stars  in  their  courses  fought 
with  Sisera.”  3  As  in  like  case  in  the  battle  of  Cressy, 
Ihe  slingers  and  the  archers  were  disabled  by  the  rain, 
the  swordsmen  were  crippled  by  the  biting  cold.  The 
Israelites,  on  the  other  hand,  having  the  storm  on  their 
rear,  wrere  less  troubled  by  it,  and  derived  confidence 
from  the  consciousness  of  this  Providential  aid.  The 
confusion  became  great.  The  “rain  descended,”  the 
four  rivulets  of  Megiddo  were  swelled  into  powerful 

1  Judg.  v.  19.  The  whole  of  this  repetition  of  the  word  “  fought  ”  from 

scene  I  traversed  in  1862.  the  previous  verses,  suggests  the  pos- 

2  Ant.  v.  5,  §  4.  sibility  that  what  is  meant  is  the  con- 

3  Judg.  v.  20.  I  have  taken  this  trast  between  the  fighting  of  the  stars 
verse,  as  it  is  usually  rendered,  as  if  for  Sisera,  and  the  flood  of  the  Kishon 
“  against.”  But  the  ambiguity  of  the  against  him. 

original  “  with,”  combined  with  the 


Lect.  XIV. 


FLIGHT  OF  SISERA. 


359 


streams,  the  torrent  of  the  Kishon  rose  into  a  flood, 
the  plain  became  a  morass.  The  chariots  and  the 
horses,  which  should  have  gained  the  day  for  the  Car 
naanites,  turned  against  them.  They  became  entangled 
in  the  swamp ;  the  torrent  of  Kishon  —  the  torrent 
famous  through  former  ages  —  swept  them  away  in 
its  furious  eddies ;  and  in  that  wild  confusion  “  the 
“ strength”  of  the  Canaanites  “was  trodden  down,”  and 
“  the  horsehoofs  stamped  and  struggled  by  the  means 
“  of  the  plungings  and  plungings  of  the  mighty  chiefs  ’’ 
in  the  quaking  morass  and  the  rising  streams.  Far 
and  wide  the  vast  army  fled,  far  through  the  The  flight, 
eastern  branch  of  the  plain  by  Endor.  There,  between 
Tabor  and  the  Little  Hermon,  a  carnage  took  place 
long  remembered,  in  which  the  corpses  lay  fattening 
the  ground.1  Onwards  from  thence  they  still  fled  over 
the  northern  hills  to  the  city  of  their  great  captain,  — 
Harosheth  of  the  Gentiles.2  Fierce  and  rapid  was  the 
pursuit.  One  city,  by  which  the  pursuers  and  pur¬ 
sued  passed,  gave  no  help.  “  Curse  ye  Meroz,  curse 
“  ye  with  a  curse  its  inhabitants,  because  they  The  fall  of 
“  came  not  to  the  help  of  Jehovah.”  So,  as  it  Mer02, 
would  seem,  spoke  the  prophetic  voice  of  Deborah.3 
We  can  imagine  what  was  the  crime  and  what  the 
punishment  from  the  analogous  case  of  Succoth  and 
Penuel,  which,  in  like  manner,  gave  no  help  when 
Gideon  pursued  the  Midianites.  The  curse  was  so  fully 
carried  out,  that  the  name  of  Meroz  never  again  ap¬ 
pears  in  the  sacred  history.4  Of  the  Canaanite  fugitives, 
none  reached  their  own  mountain  fortress :  even  the 

1  “  WThich  perished  at  Endor,  and  3  “  The  messenger  of  the  Lord.” 
became  as  dung  for  the  earth.”  (Ps.  (Judg.  v.  23.) 

ixxxiii.  10.)  4  Eusebius  and  Jerome,  however, 

2  Judg.  iv.  16.  mention  a  spot  near  Dothan,  of  this 

name.  ( Onomasticon  de  Locis  Heb.) 


360 


DEBORAH. 


Lect.  XIV. 


tidings  of  the  disaster  were  long  delayed.  "From  the 
high  latticed  windows  of  Harosheth,  the  inmates  of 
Sisera’s  harem,  his  mother,  and  her  attendant  prin¬ 
cesses,  are  on  the  stretch  of  expectation  for  the  sight 
of  the  war-car  of  their  champion,  with  the  lesser 
chariots  around  him.  They  sustain  their  hopes  by 
counting  over  the  spoils  that  he  will  bring  home, — 
rich  embroidery  for  themselves ;  female  slaves  for  each 
of  the  chiefs.  The  prey  would  never  come.  That 
well-known  chariot  of  iron  would  never  return.  It 
was  left  to  rust  on  the  banks  of  the  Kishon,  like  Rod¬ 
erick’s  by  the  shores  of  the  Guadalete.  In  the  moment 
of  the  general  panic,  Sisera  had  sprung  from  his  seat, 
and  escaped  on  foot  over  the  northern  mountains 
towards  Hazor.  It  must  have  been  three  days  after 
the  battle  that  he  reached  a  spot,  which  seems  to 
gather  into  itself,  as  in  the  last  scene  of  an  eventful 
drama,  all  the  characters  of  the  previous  acts.  Be¬ 
tween  Hazor,  the  capital  of  Jabin,  and  Kedesh-Naph- 
tali,  the  birthplace  of  Barak,  —  each  within  a  day’s 
journey  of  the  other,  —  lies,  raised  high  above  the 
plain  of  Merom,  amongst  the  hills  of  Naphtali,1  a  green 
plain,  which  joins  almost  imperceptibly  with  that  over¬ 
hung  by  Kedesh-Naphtali  itself.  This  plain  is  still, 
The  oak  of  and  was  then,  studded  with  massive  terebinths, 
zaanaim.  Naphtali  itself  seems  to  have  derived  from 

them  the  symbol  of  its  tribe,  “  a  towering  terebinth.” 2 
They  were  themselves  marked  in  that  early  age  by  a 
sight  unusual  in  this  part  of  Palestine.  Underneath 
the  spreading  branches  of  one  of  them  there  dwelt, 
unlike  the  inhabitants  of  the  surrounding  villages,  a 

1  Josh.  xix.  33,  Allon-Zaananim.  2  Gen.  xlix.  21  (Hebrew). 

Judg.  iv.  11,  mistranslated  “Plain  of 
Zaanaim.” 


Lect.  XIV. 


FLIGHT  OF  SISERA. 


361 


settlement  of  Bedouins,  living,  as  if  in  the  desert,  with 
their  tents  pitched,  and  their  camels  and  asses  around 
them,  whence  the  spot  had  acquired  the  name  of  “  the 
Terebinth,”  or  “  Oak,  of  the  Unloading  of  Tents.”  Be¬ 
tween  Heber,  the  chief  of  this  little  colony,  and  the 
king  of  Hazor,  there  was  peace.  It  would  even  seem 
that  from  him,  or  from  his  tribe,  thus  planted  on  the 
debatable  ground  between  Kedesh  and  Hazor,  Sisera 
had  derived  the  first  intelligence  of  the  insurrection.3 
Thither,  therefore,  it  was  that,  confident  in  Arab  fidelity, 
the  wearied  general  turned  his  steps.  He  approached 
the  tent,  not  of  Heber,  but  for  the  sake  of  greater 
security,2  the  harem  of  the  chieftainess,  Jael,  the 
“  Gazelle.”  It  was  a  fit  name  for  a  Bedouin’s  wife  — 
especially  for  one  whose  family  had  come  from  the 
rocks  of  Engedi,  “  the  spring  of  the  wild  goat  ”  or 
“  chamois.”  The  long,  low  tent  was  spread  under  the 
tree,  and  from  under  its  cover  she  advanced  jaei. 
to  meet  him  with  the  accustomed  reverence.  “Turn 
“in,  my  lord,  turn  in,  and  fear  not.”  She  covered 
him  with  a  rough  wrapper  or  rug,  on  the  slightly 
raised  divan  inside  the  tent;  and  he,  exhausted  with 
his  flight,  lay  down,  and  then,  lifting  up  his  head, 
begged  for  a  drop  of  water  to  cool  his  parched  lips. 
She  brought  him  more  than  water.  She  unfastened 
the  mouth  of  the  large  skin,  such  as  stand  by  Arab 
tents,  which  was  full  of  sweet  milk  from  the  herds  or 
the  camels.  She  offered,3  as  for  a  sacrificial  feast,  in 
the  bowl  used  for  illustrious  guests,4  the  thick  curded 

1  Judg.  iv.  12.  4  “The  milk  was  presented  to  us  in 

2  From  the  security  of  the  wife’s  a  wooden  bowl ;  the  liquid  butter  in  an 

tent,  the  valuables,  culinary  utensils,  earthenware  dish  ”  (Irby  and  Mangles, 
&c.,  are  kept  in  it.  481).  “  Once  we  had  milk  sweetened 

3  The  word  translated  “  brought  and  curdled  to  the  consistency  of  liq- 
forth,”  Judg.  t.  25,  has  this  meaning,  uid  jelly,  too  thick  to  be  drunk,  and 

46 


362 


DEBOKAH. 


Lect.  XIV. 


milk,  frothed  like  cream,  and  the  weary  man  drank, 
and  then  (secure  in  the  Bedouin  hospitality  which  re¬ 
gards  as  doubly  sure  the  life  of  one  who  has  eaten 
and  drunk  at  the  hand  of  his  host)  he  sank  into  a 
deep  sleep,  as  she  again  drew  round  him  the  rough 
Themur-  covering  which  for  a  moment  she  had  with- 
der*  drawn.  Then  she  saw  that  her  hour  was  come. 
She  pulled  up  from  the  ground  the  large  pointed  peg 
or  nail 1  which  fastened  down  the  ropes  of  the  tent, 
and  held  it  in  her  left  hand ;  with  her  right  hand  she 
grasped  the  ponderous  hammer  or  wooden  mallet  of 
the  workmen  of  the  tribe.  Her  attitude,  her  weapon, 
her  deed,  are  described  both  in  the  historic  and  poetic 
account  of  the  event,  as  if  fixed  in  the  national  mind. 
She  stands  like  the  personification  of  the  figure  of 
speech,  so  famous  in  the  names  of  Judas  the  Macca- 
bee ,2  and  Charles  Martel ;  the  Hammer  of  her  country’s 
enemies.  Step  by  step  we  see  her  advance ;  first,  the 
dead  silence  with  which  she  approaches  the  sleeper, 
"slumbering  with  the  weariness  of  one  who  has  run 
"far  and  fast,”  then  the  successive  blows  with  which 
she  "  hammers,  crushes,  beats,  and  pierces  through  and 
"through”  the  forehead  of  the  upturned  face,  till  the 
point  of  the  nail  reaches  the  very  ground  on  which 
the  slumberer  is  stretched;  and  then  comes  the  one 
startling  bound,  the  contortion  of  agony,  with  which 
the  expiring  man  rolls  over  from  the  low  divan,  and 

only  to  be  taken  up  with  the  hands”  sel,  round  like  a  pan,  to  be  drunk  by 
(482).  In  a  meal  with  Aghyle  Aga,  raising  it  to  the  lips.  In  both  were 
a  Bedouin  chief,  between  Tiberias  and  dipped  the  large  flexible  cakes  of  Arab 
Tabor  in  1862,  we  had  both  these  bev-  bread,  which  lay  in  profusion  on  the 
erages.  The  sour  milk  ( Lebban )  was  carpets. 

in  a  large  pewter  vessel,  like  a  small  1  Iron,  in  Jos.  Ant.  v.  5,  §  4. 
barrel ;  a  cup  floated  in  it  to  skim  and  2  The  word  Maccab  (  u  Hammer  ”  ) 
drink  the  contents.  The  sweet  milk  is  the  very  one  used  in  Judg.  iv.  21. 

( Halib )  was  in  a  smaller  pewter  ves- 


Lect.  XIY. 


THE  MURDER  OF  SISERA. 


363 


lies  weltering  in  blood  between  her  feet  as  she  strides 
over  the  lifeless  corpse.1 

At  this  moment  Barak,  the  conqueror,  appeared. 
He  might  be  in  direct  pursuit  of  the  fugitive  chief. 
He  might  be  approaching  his  native  place,  now  hard 
by.  Out  from  the  tent,  as  before,  came  the  undaunted 
chieftainess,  and  showed  the  dead  corpse  as  it  lay 
with  the  stake  or  tent-pin  fixed  firm  in  the  shat- 
*■  tered  head.  With  this  ghastly  scene  of  the  Three 
Neighbors  of  the  hills  of  Naphtali,  thus  at  last  brought 
face  to  face,  under  the  Terebinth  of  Kedesh,  the  di¬ 
rect  narrative  suddenly  closes,  as  though  its  work 
were  done.  But  Deborah’s  song  of  victory  breaks  in, 
and  continues  in  its  highest  strains  the  echo  The  Song 
of  that  day.  In  company  with  the  returning  rah. 
conqueror,  or  herself  leading  the  chorus,  after  the 
manner  of  Hebrew  women,  the  Prophetess  poured 
forth  the  hymn  wdiich  marks  the  greatness  of  the 
crisis.  It  could  be  compared  to  nothing  short  of  the 
day  when  Israel  passed  through  the  desert.  The 
storm  which  had  been  sent  to  discomfit  the  Canaanite 
host,  recalled  the  trembling  of  the  earth,  the  heavens 
and  the  clouds  dropping  water,  the  mountains  melt¬ 
ing  from  before  the  Lord.  Barak,  with  his  long  train 
of  spoils  and  prisoners,  had  “  led  captivity  captive.” 
The  sentiment  even  of  the  woman’s  delight  in  the 
dresses  won  in  the  spoils  transpires  through  the  war¬ 
like  rejoicing :  the  pieces  of  embroidery  are  counted 
over  in  imagination,  as  they  are  torn  away  from  the 
mother  and  the  harem  of  Sisera  for  the  women  of 
Israel.  The  feelings  and  the  words  of  the  song  rang 
on  through  subsequent  times,  and  in  the  Prophet 

1  All  these  details  may  be  seen  by  examining  word  by  word  the  original 
of  Judg.  iv.  21 ;  v.  26,  27. 


364 


DEBORAH. 


Lect.  XIY 


Habakkuk,  and  still  more  in  tlie  68th  Psalm,  we 
catch  again  the  very  same  strains ;  the  march  through 
the  desert ;  the  flight  of  kings ;  the  dividing  of  the 
spoil  by  those  who  tarried  at  home.1  It  was,  as  the 
close  of  the  hymn  expresses  it,  like  the  full  burst  of 
the  sun  out  of  the  darkness  of  the  night  or  the 
blackness  of  a  storm,  “a  hero  in  his  strength.”2 

The  likeness  of  the  outward  features  of  this  deci- 
Effect  of  sive  battle  to  that  of  Cressy  has  been  already  ■ 
the  Battle,  ported  out;  the  storm,  the  cold,  the  burst 

of  sunlight,  are  all  in  each.  A  still  more  striking  re¬ 
semblance  is  the  defeat  of  the  Carthaginians,  by  Timo- 
leon,  at  the  battle  of  the  Crimesus,  in  Sicily.3  It 
opens  with  the  spirit-stirring  or  prophet-like  speech 
of  Timoleon,  “as  though  a  God  were  speaking  with 
him.”  His  encampment,  like  Barak’s,  is  on  the  hill 
above  the  river.  The  chariots  of  his  opponents  are 
broken  by  the  Greek  infantry.  The  violent  storm  of 
wind,  rain,  hail,  thunder  and  lightning,  beating  in  the 
faces  of  the  Carthaginians,  but  only  on  the  backs  of 
the  Greeks ;  the  confusion  in  the  river,  becoming 
every  moment  fuller  and  more  turbid  through  the 
violent  rain,  so  that  numbers  perished  in  the  torrent ; 
the  total  rout,  the  capture  of  the  chariots  —  the 
spoils  of  ornamented  shields  —  are  the  exact  counter¬ 
parts  of  the  victory  of  Barak  over  Sisera.  But,  in  its 
moral  aspect,  the  triumph  of  Barak  was  far  greater, 
even  than  the  triumph  of  Greek  civilization  over 
Carthaginian  barbarism.  It  was  the  enemies  of  Jeho¬ 
vah  who  had  perished.  It  was  the  securing  of  the 
true  religion  from  the  attempt  of  the  old  Paganism 

1  Habak.  iii.  3,  10,  13,  14;  Ps. 

Ixviii.  7,  8,  12,  13. 

2  Judg.  v.  31. 


3  Grote’s  Hist,  of  Greece ,  xi.  246. 
The  likeness  was  pointed  out  to  me 
by  a  friend. 


Lect.  XIV 


EFFECT  OF  THE  BATTLE. 


365 


to  recover  its  ascendency  in  the  Holy  Land.  It 
ranks,  in  the  Sacred  History,  next  after  the  Battle 
of  Beth-horon,  amongst  the  religious  battles  of  the 
world. 

And,  therefore,  not  unworthily  of  this  object  in  the 
song  of  Deborah  we  have  the  only  prophetic  utter¬ 
ance  that  breaks  the  silence  between  Moses  and 
Samuel.  Hers  is  the  one  voice  of  inspiration  (in  the 
full  sense  of  the  word)  that  breaks  out  in  the  Book 
of  Judges.  In  her  song  are  gathered  up  all  the  les¬ 
sons  which  the  rest  of  the  book  teaches  indirectly. 
Hers  is  the  life,  both  in  her  own  history  and  in  the 
whole  period,  that  expresses  the  feelings  and  thoughts 
of  thousands,  who  were  silent  till  “  she,  Deborah,  arose 
a  mother  in  Israel”  Hers  is  the  prophetic  word 
that  gives  an  utterance  and  a  sanction  to  the  thoughts 
of  freedom,  of  independence,  of  national  unity,  such 
as  they  had  never  had  before  in  the  world,  and  have 
rarely  had  since. 

It  is  this  religious  aspect  of  the  battle,  this  pro¬ 
phetic  character  of  its  chief  leader,  that  has  caused 
the  difficulty,  or  the  instruction,  which  is  to  be  de¬ 
rived  from  her  benediction  of  the  assassination  of 
Sisera. 

Few  persons  read  the  chapter  without  a  momentary 
perplexity.  Even  in  the  humblest  classes,  and  The  biess- 

•  •  •  ing  on 

holiest  hearts,  a  question  not  of  sinful  doubt,  Jaei. 
but  of  most  religious  inquiry,  arises,  —  What  is  the 
purpose  of  thus  recording  and  of  thus  blessing  an  act 
which  is  so  repugnant  to  our  notions  of  Christian  and 
European  morality? 

There  have  been  numerous  answers  given  to  this 
question;  that  for  example  of  the  Rabbis,  that  the 
act  of  Jael  was  in  self-defence  against  a  personal  out- 


366 


DEBORAH. 


Lect.  XIV. 


rage  of  Sisera;  or  of  Augustine/  that  it  was  dictated 
by  a  sudden  divine  impulse  or  revelation.  It  is  suf¬ 
ficient  to  say  of  both  these  solutions  that  they  are 
gratuitous  inventions,  equally  without  the  slightest 
foundation  in  the  narrative  itself.  And  in  the  case 
of  the  latter  hypothesis,  the  difficulty  would  not  be 
removed,  but  would  be  greatly  increased  by  this  at¬ 
tempt  to  push  it  back  into  a  still  more  sacred  region. 

It  has  been  argued,  again,  that  the  act  of  Jael  is 
not  commended  in  the  Sacred  History.  But  though 
this  is  a  true  answer  to  many  so-called  difficulties  in 
the  Old  Testament,  which  arise  merely  from  investing 
with  an  imaginary  perfection  every  subject  which  it 
treats  •  and  though  this  act  is  not  commended  ex¬ 
pressly  by  the  words  of  the  narrative,  it  is  commended 
by  its  general  spirit ;  and  also  both  by  the  spirit  and 
the  words  of  the  song  of  Deborah.  That  song,  as  has 
just  been  observed,  is  the  one  prophecy  of  the  period ; 
and,  therefore,  if  we  do  not  find  the  inspiration  of  the 
Book  of  Judges  here,  we  find  it  nowhere.  It  gives 
the  key-note  to  the  whole  book,  and  must  be  regarded 
as  the  fittest  exponent  of  its  meaning. 

But  in  fact,  the  same  answer  is  to  be  given  which 
covers  not  only  this,  but  hundreds  of  similar  cases. 
Deborah,  it  is  true,  spoke  as  a  prophetess,  but  it  was 
as  a  prophetess  enlightened  only  with  a  very  small 
portion  of  that  Divine  Light  which  went  on  brighten¬ 
ing  ever  more  and  more  unto  the  perfect  day.  She 
saw  clearly  for  a  little  way  —  but  it  was  only  for  a 
little  way.  Beyond  that,  the  darkness  of  the  time  still 
rested  upon  her  vision. 

Curse  ye  Meroz,’  said  the  angel  of  the  Lord;  cuxse 
“  ye  bitterly  the  inhabitants  thereof,”  sang  Deborah. 


1  Opp.  iii.  pp.  1,  603. 


Lect.  XIY. 


THE  BLESSING  ON  JAEL. 


367 


“  Was  it,”  asks  our  eminent  philosophic  theologian, 
“  that  she  called  to  mind  any  personal  wrongs  —  rap- 
“  ine  or  insult  —  that  she,  or  the  house  of  Lapidoth, 
"  had  received  from  Jabin  or  Sisera  ? 

“  No,  she  had  dwelt  under  her  palm-tree  in  the 
"  depth  of  the  mountains.  But  she  was  a  ‘  Mother  in 
“  Israel ;  ’  and  with  a  mother’s  heart,  and  with  the 
“  vehemency  of  a  mother’s  and  a  patriot’s  love,  she 
u  had  shot  the  light  of  love  from  her  eyes,  and  poured 
“  the  blessings  of  love  from  her  lips,  on  the  people  that 
"had  ‘ jeoparded  their  lives  unto  the  death,’  against 
“  the  oppressors  3  and  the  bitterness,  awakened  and 
"  borne  aloft  by  the  same  love,  she  precipitated  in 
"  curses  on  the  selfish  and  coward  recreants  who  ‘  came 
"  not  to  the  help  of  the  Lord,  to  the  help  of  the  Lord 
"  against  the  mighty.’  As  long  as  I  have  the  image 
"  of  Deborah  before  my  eyes,  and  while  I  throw  my- 
"  self  back  into  the  age,  country,  and  circumstances  of 
"  this  Hebrew  Boadicea,  in  the  yet  not  tamed  chaos 
"  of  the  spiritual  creation  •  as  long  as  I  contemplate 
"  the  impassioned,  high-souled,  heroic  woman,  in  all  the 
"  prominence  and  individuality  of  will  and  character, 
“  I  feel  as  if  I  were  among  the  first  ferments  of  the 
"  great  affections,  —  the  proplastic  waves  of  the  micro- 
"  cosmic  chaos,  swelling  up  against  and  yet  towards  the 
"  outspread  wings  of  the  Dove  that  lies  brooding  on 
"  the  troubled  waters.  So  long  all  is  well,  all  replete 
a  with  instruction  and  example.  In  the  fierce  and  in- 
"  ordinate,  I  am  made  to  know  and  be  grateful  for  the 
"  clearer  and  purer  radiance  which  shines  on  a  Chris- 
“  tian’s  path,  neither  blunted  by  the  preparatory  veil, 
"  nor  crimsoned  in  its  struggle  through  the  all-enwrap- 
"  ping  mist  of  the  world’s  ignorance :  whilst  in  the  self 
oblivion  of  these  heroes  of  the  Old  Testament  —  their 


368 


DEBORAH. 


Lect.  XIV. 


“  elevation  above  all  low  and  individual  interests,  above 
"  all,  in  the  entire  and  vehement  devotion  of  their  to- 
"  tal  being  to  the  service  of  their  Divine  Master  —  I 
“  find  a  lesson  of  humility,  a  ground  of  humiliation, 
"  and  a  shaming,  yet  rousing,  example  of  faith  and 
"  fealty.” 1 

And  when,  from  the  inspiration  of  Deborah,  we  pass 
to  the  deed  of  Jael,  we  must  be  content  there  also  to 
admit  the  same  imperfection  of  moral  perceptions, 
which  the  Highest  authority  has  already  recognized 
in  the  clearest  terms. 

"Ye  have  heard  that  it  hath  been  said,  Thou  shalt 
"  love  thy  neighbour  and  hate  thine  enemy.” 2  Jael  did 
hate  her  enemy  with  a  perfect  hatred.  For  the  sake 
of  destroying  him,  she  broke  through  all  the  bonds  of 
hospitality,  of  gratitude,  and  of  truth.  But  then,  it 
must  not  be  forgotten,  that  if  there  is  any  portion  of 
the  Sacred  History,  where  we  should  expect  these 
bonds  to  be  loosened,  and  a  higher  light  obscured,  it 
would  be  in  this  period  of  disorder,  "  when  there  was 
"  no  king  in  Israel,  and  when  every  one  ”  —  the  Isra¬ 
elite  warrior  here  —  the  Arabian  chieftainess  there  — 
"  did  what  was  right  in  his  or  her  eyes.”  The  allow¬ 
ance  that,  according  to  our  Saviour’s  rule,  we  make  for 
Ehud,  for  Jael,  for  Deborah,  is  precisely  the  same  that, 
if  it  were  not  Sacred  History,  we  should  at  once  ac¬ 
knowledge.  We  do  not  condemn  the  Greeks,  according 
to  the  light  which  they  had,  for  praising  Harmodius 
and  Aristogiton  in  their  plot  against  the  tyrants  of 
Athens.  We  ourselves  are  almost  inclined,  in  consid¬ 
eration  of  the  greatness  of  the  necessity,  and  the  con¬ 
fusion  of  the  time,  to  praise  the  murder  of  Murat  by 

1  Coleridge’s  Confessions  of  an  En-  2  Matt.  v.  43;  see  Lecture  X. 
quiring  Spirit ,  pp.  33,  34,  35. 


Lect.  XIV. 


THE  BLESSING  ON  JAEL. 


369 


Charlotte  Corday,  “the  angel  of  assassination,”  as  she 
has  been  termed  by  an  historian  of  unquestioned  hu¬ 
manity.  Why  should  we  not  be  as  indulgent  to  the 
characters  of  Sacred  History,  as  we  are  to  those  of 
common  history  ?  Why  should  not  a  blessing,  even 
a  Divine  blessing,  according  to  the  only  light  which 
they  were  then  able  to  bear,  be  bestowed  on  an  act, 
which  the  most  philosophic  observer  does  not  scruple 
to  bestow  as  he  looks  back  on  the  various  imperfect 
acts  of  heroism  and  courage  that  have  been  wrought 
in  troubled  and  violent  times  ? 

And,  if  we  ask  further,  what  can  we  learn  from  it  ? 
and  why  should  this  deed  and  this  commendation  of 
it  still  be  read  in  our  churches  ?  the  answer  is  this :  — 
“  The  spirit  of  the  commendation  of  Jael  is  that  God 
“  allows  largely  for  ignorance  where  He  finds  sincerity ; 
“  that  they  who  serve  Him  honestly  up  to  the  measure 
“  of  their  knowledge  are,  according  to  the  general  course 
“  of  His  Providence,  encouraged  and  blessed  •  that  they 
“whose  eyes  and  hearts  are  still  fixed  on  duty  and 
“  not  on  self,  are  plainly  that  smoking  flax  which  He 
“  will  not  quench,  but  cherish  rather  until  it  be  blown 
“  into  a  flame.  .  .  .  When  we  read  some  of  those 

“  sad  but  glorious  martyrdoms  where  good  men  —  alas ! 
“the  while  for  human  nature  —  were  both  the  victims 
“  and  the  executioners,  amidst  all  our  unmixed  admi- 
“  ration  for  the  sufferers,  may  we  not  in  some  instances 
“  hope  and  believe  that  the  persecutors  were  moved 
“  with  a  most  earnest  though  an  ignorant  zeal,  and 
“  that  like  Jael  they  sought  to  please  God,  though 
like  her  they  essayed  to  do  it  by  means  which  Christ’s 
“  Spirit  condemns  ?  .  .  .  Right  and  good  it  is  that 
“  we  should  condemn  the  acts  of  many  of  those  com- 
“  mended  in  the  Old  Testament ;  for  we  have  seen  what 

47 


370 


DEBORAH. 


Lect.  XIV. 


"prophets  and  righteous  men  for  many  an  age  were 
"not  permitted  to  see;  but  no  less  right  and  needful 
"  it  is  that  we  should  imitate  their  fearless  zeal,  with- 
"  out  which  we  in  our  knowledge  are  without  excuse ; 
"with  which  they,  by  means  of  their  unavoidable  ig¬ 
norance,  were  even  in  their  evil  deeds  blessed.”1 2 


THE  SONG  OF  DEBORAHS 

PRELUDE. 

For  the  leading  of  the  Leaders  in  Israel, 
For  the  free  self-offering  of  the  People. 

Praise  Jehovah  ! 


Hear,  O  Kings ;  give  ear,  O  Princes ; 

I  to  Jehovah,  even  I  will  sing, 

Will  sound  the  harp  to  Jehovah,  the  God  of  Israel. 


THE  EXODUS. 

O  Jehovah,  when  thou  wentest  out  of  Seir, 

When  thou  marchedst  out  of  the  field  of  Edom, 

The  earth  trembled,  the  skies  also  dropped, 

The  clouds  also  dropped  water. 

The  mountains  melted  from  before  the  face  of  Jehovah, 

Sinai  itself  from  before  the  face  of  Jehovah,  the  God  of  Israel. 


THE  DISMAY. 

In  the  days  of  Shamgar,  the  son  of  Anath, 

In  the  days  of  Jael,  ceased  the  roads ; 

And  they  that  walked  on  highways,  walked  through  crooked  roads. 


There  ceased  to  be  heads  in  Israel,  ceased  to  be, 
Till  I,  Deborah,  arose, 

Till  I  arose,  a  mother  in  Israel. 


1  Arnold’s  Sermons ,  vi.  86-88. 

2  For  the  sake  of  convenience  I 
have  here  inserted  the  Song.  A  well- 
known  and  spirited  translation  of  it 
is  to  be  found  in  Milman’s  Hist,  of  the 
Jews ,  i.  194.  In  my  own  imperfect 


knowledge  of  Hebrew,  I  have  ad¬ 
hered,  as  closely  as  I  could,  to  the 
version  of  Ewald  ( Hehraische  Poesie, 
p.  125),  following  always  the  order  of 
the  words,  and  their  exact  force  in 
the  original. 


Lect.  XIV. 


THE  SONG  OF  DEBORAH. 


THE  CHANGE. 

They  chose  gods  that  were  new, 

Then  there  was  war  in  the  gates ; 

Shield  was  there  none  or  spear, 

In  forty  thousand  of  Israel. 

My  heart  is  towards  the  lawgivers  of  Israel, 
Who  offered  themselves  willingly  for  the  people. 
Praise  Jehovah ! 

Ye  that  ride  on  white  dappled  she-asses, 

Ye  that  sit  on  rich  carpets, 

Ye  that  walk  in  the  way, 

Meditate  the  song ! 


From  amidst  the  shouting  of  the  dividers  of  spoils, 

Between  the  water-troughs, 

There  let  them  rehearse  the  righteous  acts  of  Jehovah, 

The  righteous  acts  of  His  headship  in  Israel ; 

Then  went  down  to  the  gates  the  people  of  Jehovah. 

Awake,  awake,  Deborah ! 

Awake,  awake,  utter  a  song ! 

Arise,  Barak !  and  lead  captive  thy  captives, 

Thou  son  of  Abinoam. 

THE  GATHERING. 

Then  came  down  a  remnant  of  the  nobles  of  the  people. 

Jehovah  came  down  to  me  among  the  heroes. 

Out  of  Ephraim  came  those  whose  root  is  in  Amalek, 

After  thee,  O  Benjamin,  in  thy  people ; 

Out  of  Macliir  came  down  lawgivers, 

And  out  of  Zebulun  they  that  handle  the  staff  of  those  that  number 
the  host ; 

And  the  princes  in  Issachar  with  Deborah,  and  Issachar  as  Barak, 

Into  the  valley  he  was  sent  on  his  feet. 

THE  RECREANTS. 

By  the  streams  of  Reuben  great  are  the  decisions  of  heart 
Why  sittest  thou  between  the  sheepfolds  ? 

To  hear  the  piping  to  the  flocks  ? 

At  the  streams  of  Reuben  great  are  the  searchings  of  heart 


872 


DEBORAH. 


Lect.  XIV. 


Gilead  beyond  the  Jordan  dwells, 

And  Dan,  why  sojourns  he  in  ships  ? 

Asher  sits  at  the  shore  of  the  sea, 

And  on  his  harbors  dwells. 

4 

THE  BATTLE  AND  THE  FLIGHT. 

Zebulun  is  a  people  throwing  away  its  soul  to  death, 

And  Naphtali  on  the  high  places  of  the  field. 

There  came  kings,  and  fought; 

Then  fought  kings  of  Canaan  — 

At  Taanach,  on  the  waters  of  Megiddo ; 

Gain  of  silver  took  they  not. 

From  Heaven  they  fought ; 

The  stars  from  their  courses 
Fought  with  Sisera. 

The  torrent  of  Kishon  swept  them  away, 

The  ancient  torrent,  the  torrent  Kishon. 

Trample  down,  O  my  soul,  their  strength. 

Then  stamped  the  hoofs  of  the  horses, 

From  the  plungings  and  plungings  of  the  mighty  ones. 

THE  FLIGHT. 

Curse  ye  Meroz,  said  the  messenger  of  Jehovah ; 

Curse  ye  with  a  curse  the  inhabitants  thereof ; 

Because  they  came  not  to  the  help  of  Jehovah, 

To  the  help  of  Jehovah,  with  the  heroes. 

THE  DESTROYER. 

Blessed  above  women  be  Jael, 

The  wife  of  Heber  the  Kenite, 

Above  women  in  the  tent,  blessed ! 

Water  he  asked,  milk  she  gave  ; 

In  a  dish  of  the  nobles  she  offered  him  curds. 

Her  hand  she  stretched  out  to  the  tent-pin, 

And  her  right  hand  to  the  hammer  of  the  workmen ; 
And  hammered  Sisera,  and  smote  his  head, 

And  beat  and  struck  through  his  temples. 

Between  her  feet  he  bowed,  he  fell,  he  lay, 

Between  her  feet  he  bowed,  he  fell ; 

Where  he  bowed,  there  he  fell  down  slaughtered. 


Lect.  XIV. 


THE  SONG  OF  DEBORAH. 


373 


THE  MOTHER. 

Through  the  window  stretched  forth  and  lamented 
The.  mother  of  Sisera  through  the  lattice  : 

“  Wherefore  delays  his  car  to  come  ? 
u  Wherefore  tarry  the  wheels  of  his  chariots  ?  ” 1 

The  wise  ones  of  her  princesses  answer  her, 

Yea,  she  repeats  their  answer  to  herself: 

“  Surely  they  are  finding,  are  dividing  the  prey, 

“  One  damsel,  two  damsels  for  the  head  of  each  hero. 

“  Prey  of  divers  colors  for  Sisera, 

“  Prey  of  divers  colors,  of  embroidery, 

“  One  of  divers  colors,  two  of  embroidery,  for  the  neck  [of  the 
“  prey2].” 


THE  TRIUMPH. 

So  perish  all  Thy  enemies,  O  Jehovah ; 

But  they  that  love  Thee  are  as  the  sun,  when  he  goes  forth  like 
a  giant. 


1  A  remarkable  parallel  to  this  is 
to  be  seen  in  the  Greek  Klephtic  songs, 
belonging  to  a  somewhat  similar  stage 
of  society. 

2  Shellal ,  “  prey,”  is  the  reading  of 


the  Received  Text,  for  which  Ewald 
proposes  to  substitute  shegal  (the 
queen).  Otherwise  the  connection 
of  the  word  “prey”  must  be  sup¬ 
plied. 


374 


GIDEON. 


Lect.  XV. 


LECTURE  XY. 

GIDEON. 

In  the  defeat  of  Sisera  the  last  attempt  of  the  old 
inhabitants  to  recover  their  sway  was  put  down.  The 
next  event  is  wholly  different.  It  is  the  invasion  of 

The  Midi-  the  tribes  of  the  adjoining  desert.  The  name 
anites.  0f  Midian,  though  sometimes  given  peculiarly 

to  the  tribe  on  the  south-east  shores  of  the  Gulf  of 
Akaba,1  was  extended  to  all  Arabian  tribes  on  the  east 
of  the  Jordan,  —  “the  Amalekites,  and  all  the  children 
of  the  East.”  They  have  already  appeared  at  the 
time  of  the  first  passage  of  Israel  through  the  Trans- 
jordanic  territory.  In  this,  as  on  the  former  occasion, 
they  are  governed  by  Princes  or  Chiefs  whose  names 
are  preserved.  Two  superior  chiefs  having  the  title 
of  “king,”  Zeba  and  Zalmunna;2  two  inferior,  Oreb 
and  Zeeb,  —  “the  Raven  and  the  Wolf,”  —  bearing  the 
title  of  “  princes.” 3  Their  appearance  is  brought  vividly 
before  us.  Like  the  Arab  chiefs  of  modern  days,  they 
are  dressed  in  gorgeous  scarlet  robes ; 4  on  their  necks 
and  the  necks  of  their  camels  are  crescent-like  orna¬ 
ments,  such  as  were  afterwards  worn  by  Jewish  ladies 
of  high  rank.5  All  of  them  wore  rings,  either  nose¬ 
rings  or  ear-rings  of  gold.6 

1  1  Kings  xi.  18.  See  Ewald,  ii. 

435,  &c. 

2  Judg.  viii.  5. 

3  Ibid.  vii.  25. 


4  Ibid.  viii.  26. 

5  Ibid.  viii.  26  ;  and  Isa.  iii.  10,  18 

6  Gen.  xxiv.  47  ;  xxxv.  4. 


Lect.  XV. 


FLIGHT  OF  THE  ISRAELITES. 


375 


When  these  wild  tribes,  taking  advantage  perhaps  o  ’ 
the  weakening  of  the  intervening  kingdoms  of  Am¬ 
mon  and  Moab,  burst  upon  the  country,  their  fierce 
aspect  struck  consternation  wherever  they  went.  "  Let 
"us  take  to  ourselves  the  pastures  of  God,”1 — so  in 
true  nomadic  phrase  they  are  supposed  to  speak. 
They  over-ran  the  whole  country.  Like  the  Bedouins 
who  now  make  incursions  into  the  plains  of  Esdraelon 
and  Philistia ;  like  the  Scythians,  who  in  the  reign  of 
Josiah  spread  southward  "as  far  as  Gaza;” 2  so  they, 
reaching  to  the  same  limits,  were  to  be  seen  every¬ 
where,  with  their  innumerable  tents  and  camels,  like 
the  sand  in  the  bay  of  Acre,  —  like  one  of  those  ter¬ 
rible  armies  of  locusts  described  by  the  Prophet  Joel.3 

The  panic  was  proportionably  great.  The  Israelite 
population  left  the  plains  and  took  refuge  Theflight 
in  the  hills.  Three  places  of  refuge  are  spe-  raelites. 
cially  mentioned.  First,  the  catacombs  or  galleries 
which  they  cut  out  of  the  rock,  which  are  mentioned  only 
in  this  place,  and  which,  apparently,  were  pointed  out, 
in  after-times,  as  the  memorials  of  these  troubled  days.4 
Secondly,  the  craggy  peaks,  such  as  the  rock  of  Rimmon 
and  the  inaccessible  Masada.  Thirdly,  the  limestone 
caves,  here  first  mentioned,  and  afterwards  often  used, 
like  the  Corycian  cave  in  Greece,  during  the  Persian 
invasion,  and  the  caves  of  the  Asturias  in  Spain,  during 
the  occupation  of  the  Moors.  It  was  returning  to  the 
old  Troglodyte  habits  of  the  Horites  and  Phoenicians.0 

From  this  great  calamity  Israel  was  rescued  by  a 
great  deliverer  —  the  most  heroic  of  all  the  Gideon, 
characters  of  this  period. 

1  Ps.  lxxxiii.  12.  4  Jud".  vi.  2  ;  Rosenmiiller  ad  loc. 

2  Zeph.  ii.  5,  6  ;  Judg.  vi.  4.  Comp.  Job  xxviii.  10. 

3  Joel  ii.  1-11.  5  Job  xxx.  6.  Herder,  Spirit  of 

Hebrew  Poetry ,  p.  74. 


376 


GIDEON. 


Lect.  XV 


The  mas 
sacre  on 
Mount 
Tabor. 


As  in  the  other  invasions  and  oppressions,  so  here, 
the  deliverer  is  to  be  sought  in  the  locality  nearest 
to  the  chief  scene  of  the  invasion.  Overhanging  the 
plain  of  Esdraelon,  where  the  vast  army  of  the  Mid- 
ianites  was  encamped,  were  the  hills  of  the  Western 
Manasseh.  It  was  from  a  small  family  of  this  proud 
tribe  1  that  the  champion  of  Israel  unexpectedly  rose. 
There  had  already  been  collisions  between 
them  and  the  invaders.  As  in  the  time  of 
Barak,  so  now  the  northern  tribes  seem  to 
have  met  at  the  sanctuary  of  Mount  Tabor,  and  there 
the  elder  sons  of  Joash  the  Abiezrite  had  been  over¬ 
taken  and  slain  by  the  Midianite  kings.2  They  were 
a  magnificent  family  —  every  one  of  them  was  like  a 
Prince.  And  not  the  least  regal  was  the  sole  survivor, 
Gideon.  He  was  apparently  the  youngest ;  but  had 
already  one  high-spirited  son,  —  the  boy  Jether.3  Even 
in  the  depressed  state  of  his  country  and  family,  he 
kept  up  a  dignity  of  his  own.  He  had  his  ten  slaves4 
and  his  armor-bearer,  whose  name,  Phurah,  has  been 
preserved  to  us  in  the  celebrity  of  his  master.5  His 
name  was  already  great,  as  a  “  mighty  hero,” 6  both 
amongst  the  Israelites  and  their  invaders.  It  was 
whilst  he  was  brooding  over  the  wrongs  of  his  family 
and  his  country  that  the  call  came  upon  him.7  The 
scene  was  long  preserved,  and  the  manner  of  the 
call  carries  us  back  to  the  visions  of  the  Patriarchal 


age. 


There  were  vineyards  round  his  native  Ophrah,8 


1  Judg.  vi.  15  ;  viii.  2.  “  My 

thousand  is  the  poor  one.”  Comp. 
Deut.  xxxiii.  17  (the  thousands,  i.  e 
families ,  of  Manasseh). 

2  Judg.  viii.  18. 

3  Ibid.  20. 


4  Ibid.  vi.  27. 

5  Ibid.  vii.  10. 

6  Ibid.  vi.  12,  29;  vii.  14. 

7  Ibid.  15  ;  viii.  19. 

8  Ibid.  viii.  2. 


Lect.  XY. 


THE  CALL  OF  GIDEON. 


377 


and  by  the  wine-press,  in  which  the  grapes  would 
be  trodden  out  in  the  coming  autumn,  he  now,  The  vision 
in  the  summer  months,  doubtless  with  his at  °Phrah- 
father’s  bullocks,1  was  threshing  out  the  newly  gath¬ 
ered  wheat.  Close  by  the  smooth  level  was  a  cave, 
into  which  the  juice  of  the  grapes  ran  off  through  a 
channel  cut  in  the  rocky  reservoir,  and  which  Gideon 
now  used  to  hide  the  corn  from  the  rapacious  invad¬ 
ers.  Above  this  cave,  as  it  would  seem,  stood  a  rock, 
in  the  midst  of  a  grove  of  trees,  amongst  which  the 
most  conspicuous  was  a  well-known  terebinth,  spread¬ 
ing  its  wide  branches  alike  over  the  rock  and  the 
wine-press.  The  grove  was  dedicated  (so  deeply  had 
the  Canaanitish  worship  spread  even  into  the  purest 
families)  to  Astarte.  The  rock,  with  an  altar  on  its 
summit,  was  consecrated  to  Baal,  and  was  venerated 
as  a  stronghold  or  asylum2  by  the  neighborhood.  A 
Prophet  —  whose  name  is  not  preserved  to  us3  —  had 
already  been  amongst  the  people,  with  warnings  and 
encouragements.  The  message  to  Gideon  is  described 
in  language  of  a  more  mysterious  and  solemn  kind. 
“A  messenger  of  the  Lord”  —  a  youth,  according  to 
the  tradition  in  Josephus 4  —  suddenly  appears,  leaning 
on  a  staff.  The  meal  which  Gideon  had  prepared  for 
him  beneath  the  terebinth  becomes  a  sacrifice.  The 
sacrifice  is  laid  on  the  summit  of  the  consecrated  rock, 
as  upon  a  natural  altar.  At  the  touch  of  the  way¬ 
farer’s  staff  it  is  consumed  in  flames,  and  the  heavenly 
messenger  vanishes  amidst  the  cries  of  alarm  which 
the  terrified  Gideon  utters  at  the  consciousness  of  the 

1  Judg.  vi.  25,  26.  poetical  books,  occurs  here  alone  in 

2  The  -word  Maoz ,  used  for  it  in  prose. 

Judg.  vi.  26,  though  employed  in  the  3  Judg.  vi.  8. 

4  Jos.  Ant.  v.  6,  §  8. 


48 


378 


GIDEON. 


Lect.  XV 


Divine  Presence,  till  he  receives  the  assurance  of  66  the 
Peace  of  Jehovah.” 

There  may  be  difficulties  in  the  details  of  this  nar¬ 
rative.  But  it  faithfully  exhibits  the  twofold  call  to 
Gideon  which  forms  the  framework  of  the  rest  of  his 
history. 

1.  The  first  call,  which  is  less  distinctly  described, 
The  over-  is  the  mission  —  almost  of  a  prophetic  charac- 
the  wor-  ter  —  to  strike  a  decisive  blow  at  the  growing 
Baai.°f  tendency  to  Phoenician  worship  in  the  central 
tribes  of  Palestine.  On  the  morning,  we  are  told,  of 
the  following  day,  the  villagers  assembled  for  their 
worship.  They  found  that  the  consecrated  trees  were 
cut  down.  Their  ashes  were  seen  on  the  rock.  A 
bullock  had  been  consumed  whole  in  the  flames  of 
the  pile  that  had  been  heaped  up.  The  altar  had 
been  swept  away,  and  another  new  altar  reared  in  its 
place  to  receive  this  sacrificial  pile.  The  answer  of 
Joash  to  those  who  charged  his  son  with  this  act  of 
sacrilege  is  based  on  that  grand  principle  which  runs 
through  so  large  a  part  of  the  history  of  the  Jewish 
Church,  —  that  the  real  impiety  is  in  those  who  believe 
that  God  cannot  defend  Himself.  “  Will  ye  take  upon 
u  yourselves  to  plead  Baal’s  cause  ?  Let  Baal  plead 
“  for  himself.” 1  Of  this  struggle,  and  of  this  icono- 
clasm,  two  distinct  memorials  remained.  One  was  the 
new  altar,  which  remained  into  the  times  of  the  mon¬ 
archy  on  the  sacred  rock,  bearing  in  its  name  an 
allusion  to  the  events  which  caused  its  erection, — 
Jehovah,  Peace.2  The  other  was  the  name  adopted  by 
Gideon,  and  perpetuated  in  different  forms  as  Jerub- 
baal,  Jerub-bosheth,  Hierobaal,  and  Hierombal.  Either 

1  Judg.vi.  31.  Compare  Gamaliel’s  2  Judg.  vi.  23,  24. 
speech,  Acts  v.  38  39 


Lect.  XV. 


THE  BATTLE  OF  JEZREEL. 


379 


as  the  destroyer  of  the  old,  or  the  constructor  of  the 
new  sanctuary,  of  which  he  afterwards  became  the 
Priest  and  Oracle,  this  name  remained  side  by  side 
with  that  which  he  bore  as  the  deliverer  from  Midian,1 
and  was  the  one  which,  alone  of  the  names  of  this 
period,  penetrated  into  the  Gentile  world.2 

2.  The  second  call  is  that  by  which  in  later  times 
Gideon  has  been  chiefly  known,  —  the  war  ofTheinsur_ 
insurrection  against  Midian.  His  own  char- 
acter  is  well  indicated  in  the  sign  of  the Mldian- 
fleece 3  —  cool  in  the  heat  of  all  around,  dry  when  all 
around  were  damped  by  fear.  Throughout  we  see 
three  great  qualities,  decision,  caution,  and  magnanimity. 
The  summons,  as  usual,  by  the  well-known  horn,  first 
convenes  his  own  clan  of  Abiezer ;  next,  his  own 
tribe  of  Manasseh ;  and  lastly,  the  three  northern 
tribes.  Zebulun  and  Naphtali  are  still  the  faithful 
amongst  the  faithless,  the  nucleus  of  independence, 
as  in  the  war  of  Deborah,  as  in  the  final  war  of  Jew¬ 
ish  patriotism  against  Rome.  Asher  has  this  time  left 
his  home  by  the  shores  of  Accho ;  but  Issachar,  over¬ 
run  by  the  Arab  tribes,  is  absent. 

The  career  of  Gideon  is  more  than  a  battle,  it  is 
a  campaign  or  war,  which  divides  itself  into  three 
parts. 

The  first  is  the  battle  of  Jezreel.  The  Midianite 
encampment  was  on  the  northern  side  of  the  The  battle 
valley,  between  Gilboa  and  Little  Hermon.  of  JezreeL 
The  Israelite  encampment  was  on  the  slope  of  Mount 
Gilboa,  by  the  spring  of  Jezreel,  called,  from  The  Spring 
the  incident  of  this  time,  "the  Spring  of  Trem-  wing. 

1  Judg.  vii.  1  ;  viii.  29;  1  Sam.  xii.  Hierombal  see  Euseb.  Pr.  Ev.  i.  9; 

11.  Evvald,  ii. 

2  For  Hierobaal  see  LXX.  For  3  Ewald,  ii.  500. 


380 


GIDEON. 


Lect.  XV 


bling.”  There  had  been  the  usual  war-cry  —  “  What 

"  man  is  there  that  is  fearful  and  faint-hearted  ?  Let 
"  him  go  and  return  unto  his  house,  lest  his  brethren’s 
“  heart  faint  as  well  as  his  heart.” 1  It  was  modi- 
v  lied  on  this  occasion  by  its  adaptation  either  to  the 
peculiar  war-cry  of  Manasseh,  or  to  the  actual  scene 
of  the  encampment  —  "  Whosoever  is  afraid,  let  him 
return  from  Mount  Gilead,” 2  or  (according  to  another 
reading)  "from  Mount  Gilboa.”  This  had  removed 
the  cowards  from  the  army.  The  next  step  was  to 
remove  the  rash.3  At  the  brink  of  the  spring,  those 
who  rushed  headlong  down  to  quench  their  thirst, 
throwing  themselves  on  the  ground,  or  plunging 
their  mouths  into  the  water,  were  rejected,  those 
who  took  up  the  water  in  their  hands,  and  lapped 
it  with  self-restraint,  were  chosen. 

Gideon,  thus  left  alone  with  his  three  hundred  men, 
now  needed  an  augury  for  himself.  This  was  granted 
to  him.  It  was  night,  when  he  and  his  armor-bearer 
descended  from  their  secure  position  above  the  spring 
to  the  vast  army  below.  They  reached  the  outskirts 
of  the  tents  amidst  the  deep  silence  which  had  fallen 
over  the  encampment,  where  the  thousands  of  Arabs 
lay  rapt  in  sleep  or  resting  from  their  plunder, 
with  their  innumerable  camels  moored  in  peaceful 
repose  around  them.  One  of  the  sleepers,  startled 
from  his  slumbers,  was  telling  his  dream  to  his  fellow. 
A  thin  round  cake  of  barley  bread,  of  the  most  hoine- 
The  panic,  ly  bread,4  from  those  rich  cornfields,  those  nu¬ 
merous  threshing-places,  those  deep  ovens  sunk  in 
the  ground,  which  they  had  been  plundering,  came 

1  Deut.  xx.  8.  2  Judg.  vii.  3.  See  Lecture  IX. 

3  This,  in  the  Koran  (ii.  250-252),  4  Josephus,  Ant.  v.  6,  §4.  Thom- 

is  ascribed  to  Saul.  son’s  Land  and  Book,  p.  449. 


Lect.  XV. 


THE  BATTLE  OF  THE  ROCK  OF  OREB. 


381 


rolling  into  the  camp,  till  it  reached  the  royal  tent 
in  the  centre,  which  fell  headlong  before  it,  and  was 
turned  over  and  over,  till  it  lay  flat  upon  the  ground. 
Like  the  shadow  of  Richard,  which,  centuries  later, 
was  believed  to  make  the  Arab  horses  start  at  the 
sight  of  a  bush,  one  name  only  seemed  to  occur 
as  the  interpretation  of  this  sign :  66  The  sword  of 
Gideon,  the  son  of  Joash.”  The  Awful  Listener  heard 
the  good  omen,  bowed  himself  to  the  ground  in 
thankful  acknowledgment  of  it,  and  disappeared  up 
the  mountain-side.  The  sleepers  and  the  dreamers 
slept  on  to  be  waked  up  by  the  blast  of  the  pas¬ 
toral  horns,  and  at  the  same  moment  the  crashing 
of  the  three  hundred  pitchers,  and  the  blaze  of  the 
three  hundred  torches,  and  the  shout  of  Israel,  always 
terrible,  which  broke  through  the  stillness  of  the  mid¬ 
night  air  from  three  opposite  quarters  at  once.  In  a 
moment  the  camp  was  rushing  hither  and  thither  in 
dark  confusion,  with  the  dissonant  “  cries  ”  peculiar  to 
the  Arab  race.  Every  one  drew  his  sword  against 
every  other,  and  the  host  fled  headlong  down  the 
descent  to  the  Jordan,  to  the  spots  known  as  the 
House  of  the  Acacia,  and  the  margin  of  the  Meadow 
of  the  Dance. 

Their  effort  was  to  cross  the  river  at  the  fords  of 
Bethbarah.  It  was  immediately  under  the  The  battle 
mountains  of  Ephraim,  and  to  the  Ephraim-  of  Oreb. 
ites  accordingly  messengers  were  sent  to  interrupt 
the  passage.  The  great  tribe,  roused  at  last,  was 
not  slow  to  move.  By  the  time  that  they  reached 
the  river,  the  two  greater  chiefs  had  already  crossed, 
and  the  encounter  took  place  with  the  two  lesser 
chiefs,  Oreb  and  Zeeb.  They  were  caught  and  slain : 
one  at  a  wine-press,  known  afterwards  as  the  wine- 


382 


GIDEON. 


Lect.  XY. 


press  of  Zeeb,  or  the  Wolf ;  the  other  on  a  rock,  which 
from  him  took  the  name  of  the  Rock  of  Oreb,  or  the 
Raven ;  round  which,  or  upon  which,  the  chief  car¬ 
nage  had  taken  place,  —  so  that  the  whole  battle  was 
called  in  after-times,  “  The  slaughter  of  Midian  at  the 
Rock  of  Oreb”1  The  Ephraimites  passed  the  Jordan, 
and  overtook  Gideon,  and  presented  to  him  the  severed 
heads.  Their  remonstrance  at  not  having  before  been 
called  to  take  part  in  the  struggle,  is  as  characteristic 
of  the  growing  pride  of  Ephraim,  as  his  answer  is  of 
the  forbearance  and  calmness  which  places  him  at 
the  summit  of  the  heroes  of  this  age.  The  gleaning 
of  Ephraim  in  the  bloody  heads  of  those  chieftains,  he 
told  them,  was  better  than  the  full  vintage  of  slaugh¬ 
ter,  in  the  unknown  multitudes,  by  the  little  family 
of  Abi-ezer. 

He,  meantime,  was  in  full  chase  of  his  enemies. 
“  Faint,  yet  pursuing,”  is  the  expressive  description 
of  the  union  of  exhaustion  and  energy  which  has 
given  the  words  a  place  in  the  religious  feelings  of 
mankind.  Succoth  and  Penuel,  the  two  scenes  of 
Jacob’s  early  life,  on  the  track  of  his  entrance  from 
the  East,  as  of  the  Midianites’  return  towards  it,  were 
Gideon’s  two  halting-places,  —  the  little  settlement  in 
the  Jordan  valley,  now  grown  into  a  flourishing  town, 
with  its  eighty-seven  chiefs,  —  the  lofty  watch-tower 
overlooking  the  country  far  and  wide.  At  Karkor, 

The  battle  far  in  the  deserb  beyond  the  usual  range  of 
of  Karkor.  ^he  nomadic  tribes,  he  fell  upon  the  Arabian 

host.  They2  had  fled  with  a  confusion  which  could 
only  be  compared  to  clouds  of  chaff  and  weeds  flying 
before  the  blast  of  a  furious  hurricane,  or  the  rapid 

1  Isa.  x.  26.  2  Ps.  lxxxiii.  9-11.  See  Mr.  Grove 

on  Oreb  in  the  Diet,  of  Bible. 


Lect.  XV. 


THE  IMPORTANCE  OF  THE  CRISIS. 


383 


spread  of  a  conflagration  where  the  flames  leap  from 
tree  to  tree  and  from  hill  to  hill  in  the  dry  forests  of 
the  mountains ;  and  in  the  midst  of  this  were  taken 
the  two  leaders  of  the  horde,  Zeba  and  Zalmunna. 
Then  came  the  triumphant  return,  and  the  vengeance 
on  the  two  cities  for  their  inhospitalities.  The  tower 
of  the  Divine  Vision  was  razed ;  the  chiefs  of  Succoth 
were  beaten  to  death  with  the  thorny  branches  of 
the  neighboring  acacia  groves.  The  two  kings  of 
Midian,  in  all  the  state  of  royal  Arabs,  were  brought 
before  the  conqueror  on  their  richly  caparisoned 
dromedaries.  They  replied  with  all  the  spirit  of  Arab 
chiefs  to  Gideon,  who  for  a  moment  almost  gave  way 
to  his  gentler  feelings  at  the  sight  of  such  fallen 
grandeur.  But  the  remembrance  of  his  brothers’ 
blood  on  Mount  Tabor  steels  his  heart,  and  when  his 
boy,  Jether,  shrinks  from  the  task  of  slaughter,  he 
takes  their  lives  with  his  own  hand,  and  gathers  up 
the  vast  spoils,  the  gorgeous  dresses  and  ornaments, 
with  which  they  and  their  camels  were  loaded. 

How  signal  the  deliverance  was,  appears  from  its 
many  memorials :  the  name  of  Gideon’s  altar,  of  the 
spring1  of  Harod,  of  the  rock  of  Oreb,  of  the  wine¬ 
press  of  Zeeb ;  whilst  the  Prophets  and  Psalmist  al¬ 
lude  again  and  again  to  details  not  mentioned  in  the 
history,  —  “  The  rod  of  the  oppressor  broken  as  in 
“  the  day  of  Midian  ” 2  —  the  wild  panic  of  “  the 
“confused  noise  and  garments  rolled  in  blood  ”  — 
the  streams  of  blood  that  flowed  round  “  the  rock  of 
Oreb  ”  —  the  insulting  speeches,  and  the  desperate 
rout,  as  before  fire  and  tempest,  of  the  four  chiefs 
whose  names  passed  even  into  a  curse,  —  “  Make  thou 

1  Mistranslated  “  well”  in  the  Au-  2  Isa.  ix. 4  ;  x. 26  ;  Ps. lxxxiii.  9-11. 
thorized  Version. 


384 


GIDEON. 


Lect.  XV. 


“  their  nobles  like  Oreb  and  Zeeb,  yea,  all  their  princes 
“like  Zeba  and  Zalmunna.” 

But  the  most  immediate  proof  of  the  importance 
of  this  victory  was  that  it  occasioned  the  first  direct 
Royal  attempt  to  establish  the  kingly  office,  and  ren- 
Gideon.  der  it  perpetual  in  the  house  of  Gideon.  “  Buie 
“  thou  over  us,  both  thou  and  thy  son,  and  thy  son’s 
“  son :  for  thou  hast  delivered  us  from  the  hand  of 
“  Midian.”  Gideon  declines  the  office.  But  he  reigns, 
notwithstanding,  in  all  but  regal  state.  His  vast  mil¬ 
itary  mantle  receives  the  spoils  of  the  whole  army.1 
He  combines,  like  David,  the  sacerdotal  and  the  regal 
power.  An  image,  clothed  with  a  sacred  ephod,  is 
made  of  the  Midianite  spoils,  and  his  house  at  Ophrah 
becomes  a  sanctuary,  and  he  apparently  is  known 
even  to  the  Phoenicians  as  a  Priest.2  He  adopts,  like 
David,  the  unhappy  accompaniment  of  royalty,  polyg¬ 
amy,  with  its  unhappy  consequences.  It  is  evident 
that  we  have  reached  the  climax  of  the  period.  We 
feel  “  all  the  goodness  ” 3  of  Gideon.  There  is  a  sweet¬ 
ness  and  nobleness,  blended  with  his  courage,  such  as 
lifts  us  into  a  higher  region,  —  something  of  the  past 
greatness  of  Joshua,  something  of  the  future  grace  of 
David.  But  he  was,  as  we  should  say,  before  his  age. 
The  attempt  to  establish  a  more  settled  form  of  gov¬ 
ernment  ended  in  disaster  and  crime.  He  himself 
remains  as  a  character  apart,  faintly  understood  by 
others,  imperfectly  fulfilling  his  own  ideas,  staggering 
under  a  burden  to  which  he  was  not  equal.  In  his 
union  of  superstition  and  true  religion,  in  his  myste¬ 
rious  loneliness  of  situation,  he  recalls  to  us  one  of 
the  greatest  characters  of  heathen  history,  with  the 
additional  interest  of  the  high  sacred  element.  “  His 

1  Judg.  viii.  25  (Hebrew).  2  Eus.  Pr.  Ev.  i.  9.  3  Judg.  viii.  35. 


Lect.  XV. 


THE  USURPATION  OF  ABIMELECH. 


385 


“  mind  rose  above  the  state  of  things  and  men ;  ”  so 
we  may  apply  to  him  what  has  been  said  of  Scipio 
Africanus  —  “his  spirit  was  solitary  and  kingly;  he  was 
“  cramped  by  living  amongst  those  as  his  equals  whom 
“  he  felt  fitted  to  guide  as  from  a  higher  sphere ;  and 
“he  retired  to  his  native”  Ophrah  “to  breathe  freely, 
“  since  he  could  not  fulfil  his  natural  calling  to  be  a 
“  hero-king.” 1 

The  career  of  Gideon,  so  poetical,  so  elevated,  so 
complete  in  itself,  seems  at  first  sight  but  unevenly 
combined  with  the  impotent  conclusion  of  the  prosaic 
and  almost  secular  story  of  Abimelech.  But  this  story 
has  an  interest  of  its  own,  independently  of  the  grander 
narrative  to  which  it  is  a  close  sequel  in  the  liveliness 
of  its  details. 

We  are  suddenly  introduced  for  the  first  and  only 
time  in  the  Book  of  Judges  to  the  ancient  capital  of 
the  nation  in  Shechem.  In  that  beautiful  and  Rise  of 
venerable  city,  the  old  inhabitants  had  still  lin-  Abimelech* 
gered  after  the  conquest.  One  of  the  maidens  of  the 
city  had  become  a  slave  of  the  great  Gideon,  and  by 
her  he  had  added  another  son  to  his  already  numer¬ 
ous  offspring.2  Abimelech  inherited  the  daring  energy 
of  his  father,  without  his  self-control  and  magnanimity. 
He  determined  to  avail  himself,  on  the  one  hand,  of 
the  growing  tendency  to  a  monarchical  form  of  govern¬ 
ment  (“Is  it  better  that  threescore  and  ten  persons 
“  or  that  one  reign  over  you  ?  ” ) ;  and,  on  the  other 
hand,  he  appealed  to  the  common  element  of  race 
between  himself  and  the  subject  Shechemites,  like  our 
Henry,  the  first  Norman  son  of  a  Saxon  mother, 
“  Kemember  that  I  am  your  bone  and  your  flesh.”3 
To  this  appeal  they  at  once  responded,  “  He  is  our 

1  Arnold’s  Rome ,  iii.  314.  2  Judg.  viii.  31.  3  Ibid.  ix.  2. 

49 


386 


GIDEON. 


Lect.  XV. 


brother  .”  From  the  treasury  of  the  sanctuary,1  which 
they  in  league  with  the  neighboring  cities  had  estab¬ 
lished,  they  granted  him  a  subsidy ;  and  with  this  and 
a  body  of  insurgents  he  marched  on  Ophrah,  where 
his  seventy  brothers  still  held  their  aristocratic  court, 
and  slew  the  whole  family  on  “one  stone,”  probably 
on  that  same  consecrated  rock  whence,  years  before, 
his  father  had  thrown  down  the  altar  of  Baal.  It  is 
the  first  recorded  instance  of  the  dreadful  usage  of 
Oriental  monarchies,  —  “  the  slaughter  of  the  brothers 
of  kings,”  which  has  continued  down  to  our  own  days 
in  the  Turkish  Empire,  and  has  passed  long  ago  into 
Bacon’s  famous  proverb.  To  Shechem,  his  birthplace, 
and  the  seat  of  the  ancient  government  of  Joshua,  of 
the  future  monarchy  of  Israel,  Abimelech  retired  in 
triumph ;  and  there,  beside  the  oak  whence  Joshua 
had  addressed  the  nation,  where  probably  in  after-days 
the  princes  of  Israel  were  inaugurated,  Abimelech  re¬ 
ceived,  the  first  in  the  sacred  history,  the  name  of 
King.  It  was  in  the  midst  of  this  festive  solemnity 
that  a  voice  was  heard  from  the  heights  of  Gerizim, 
memorable  in  this  crisis  of  Shechem,  but  memorable 
also  in  the  history  of  the  Church,  for  it  is  the  first  re¬ 
parable  of  corded  Parable.  One  only  child  of  the  family 
jotham.  0f  Gideon  had  escaped, — Jotham,  who  in  this 
quaint  address  develops  the  quiet  humor  and  sagacity 
of  his  father  and  grandfather,  who  had  each  turned 
away  the  wrath  of  their  hearers  by  a  short  apologue. 
He  from  his  concealment  had  suddenly  presented 
himself  on  one  of  the  rocky  spurs  that  project  from 
Gerizim  over  the  valley,  probably  from  the  conspicu¬ 
ous  cliff  that  rises  precipitously  above  what  must  have 
been  the  exact  situation  of  the  ancient  Shechem.  From 


1  See  Lecture  XIII. 


Lect.  XV. 


PARABLE  OF  JOTHAM. 


387 


that  lofty  pulpit,1  inaccessible,  but  audible  from  below, 
he  broke  forth,  no  doubt  in  the  chant  or  loud  lament 
in  which  Eastern  story-tellers  recite  their  tales,  with 
the  fable,  describing  the  disadvantages  of  government 
and  of  monarchy  in  all  countries,  but  drawn  from  the 
very  imagery  which  lay  beneath  him  at  the  moment. 
It  is  the  earliest  parable.  Like  all  the  parables  of  the 
earlier  times  of  the  Jewish  nation,  it  turns  on  the 
vegetable  world.  The  vine,  the  cedar,  the  thistle,2  in 
the  fables  of  Palestine,  take  the  place  which,  in  the 
fables  of  India  or  of  Greece,  is  occupied  by  the  talk¬ 
ing  beasts  or  birds.  His  eye  rested  on  that  unparal¬ 
leled  mass  of  living  verdure  in  which,  alone  of  all  the 
cities  of  Palestine,  Shechem  is  embosomed.  He  imag¬ 
ined  the  ancient  days  of  the  earth  when  all  those  trees 
were  endued  with  human  instincts  and  human  speech, 
and  bade  his  hearers  listen  to  them  as  they  gathered 
themselves  together  in  that  green  council  to  elect  their 
king.  First  (so  we  may  fill  up  the  outline  which  then 
must  have  been  supplied  by  the  actual  sight  of  the 
hearers)  came  all  the  lower  trees  to  the  chief  of  all 
that  grow  in  that  fertile  valley,  —  the  venerable  Olive. 
But  the  Olive  could  not  leave  his  useful  and  noble  task 
of  supplying  the  sacred  purposes  of  God  and  man,  and 
remained  rooted  in  his  ancient  place.  Next  they  ap¬ 
proached  the  broad  green  shade  of  the  Fig-tree.  But 
he,  too,  had  the  delicious  sweetness  of  his  good  fruit 
to  care  for,  and  his  answer  was  the  same  as  that  of 
the  Olive.  Then  they  addressed  the  luxuriant  Vine, 
as  he  threw  his  festoons  from  tree  to  tree,  along  the 
side  of  the  hill.  But  the  Vine  clings  to  his  appointed 
work  of  “cheering  God  and  man,”  and  he,  too,  abjured 

i  This  was  pointed  out  to  me  by  Dr.  2  Judg.  ix.  12  ;  Isa.  v.  1 ;  2  Kings 

Rosen  in  1862.  xiv.  9. 


388 


GIDEON. 


Lect.  XV. 


the  idle  state  of  monarchy.  One  and  all  the  nobler 
trees  were  the  true  likenesses  of  the  noble  race  of 
Gideon, — in  his  usefulness,  his  sweetness,  and  his  gayety 
of  speech  and  life.  It  was  to  a  lower  growth  that  the 
trees  must  descend  before  they  could  find  any  that 
would  undertake  the  thankless  task  of  ruler.  The 
Brier,  the  Bramble,  the  Thorn  that  crept  along  the 
barren  side  of  the  mountain,  or  under  the  cover  of  the 
walls  of  the  vineyard  or  the  orchard,  had  no  loftier 
cares  to  distract  him  from  the  calling  they  proposed. 
It  was  the  Brier,  with  which,  doubtless  then,  as  now 
in  the  sacrificial  feast  on  Mount  Gerizim,  huge  fires 
were  kindled;  and  from  him,  useless  and  idle  as  he 
seemed  to  be,  a  blaze  would  come  forth  in  which  friends 
and  foes  alike  would  burn,: — a  wide-spreading  conflagra¬ 
tion  which  would  fly  from  hill  to  hill,  till  it  swept  within 
its  range  the  distant  cedars  of  Lebanon.  This  was  the 
true  likeness  of  the  worthless  but  fierce  Abimelech,  of  the 
first  tyrant  of  the  Jewish  nation.  So,  from  the  rock, 
the  youthful  Seer  pronounced  his  curse,  —  in  that  faith¬ 
ful  picture  of  the  degraded  politics  of  a  degenerate  or 
a  half-civilized  state,  when  only  the  worst  take  any  con¬ 
cern  in  public  interests,  when  all  that  is  good  and  noble 
turns  away  in  disgust  from  so  thankless  and  vulgar  an 
ambition.  He  spoke  like  the  Bard  of  the  English  Ode, 
and,  before  the  startled  assembly  below  could  reach  the 
rocky  pinnacle  where  he  stood,  he  was  gone.  Imme¬ 
diately  behind  him  (if  we  have  rightly  conjectured  the 
spot  where  he  stood)  vast  caverns  open  in  the  moun¬ 
tain-side.  There  he  might  halt  for  the  moment.  But 
he  stayed  not  till  he  was  far  away  in  the  south,  per¬ 
haps  beyond  the  Jordan.1 

1  “  lie  fled  to  Beer.”  Ewald  conjee-  16,  on  the  frontier  of  Moab.  If  this 
tures  that  it  was  the  Beer  of  Num.  xxi.  seems  too  remote,  it  may  be  Beeroth, 


Lect.  XV.  INTERNAL  STATE  OF  SHECHEM.  389 

I 

The  three  years’  reign  of  Abimelech  which  follows 
discloses  to  us  the  interior  of  society  in  this  Internal 
centre  of  Palestine.  That  light  which  the  in-  shechem. 
ventive  genius  of  Walter  Scott  and  the  briliant  exag¬ 
geration  of  Thierry  threw  on  the  complicated  rela¬ 
tions  of  Anglo-Saxon  and  Norman  long  after  the 
Conquest  of  England,  is  thrown  by  this  simple  and 
vivid  narrative  on  the  like  relations  of  Canaanite 
and  Israelite  after  the  Conquest  of  Palestine.  The 
supporters  of  Abimelech,  as  we  have  seen,  were  the 
native  Shechemites,  —  the  a  lords  ”  of  Shechem,  as  they 
are  called,  by  a  name  specially  appropriate  to  the 
native  races  of  Canaan.1  This  remnant  of  the  original 
population,  with  the  adherents  gained  from  amongst 
the  conquerors,  had  elevated  Shechem  into  a  kind  of 
metropolitan  dignity  amongst  the  neighboring  towns ; 
who  thus  formed  a  religious  league,  of  which  the 
Temple  was  at  Shechem,  under  the  name  of  Baal- 
Berith,  or  Baal  of  the  League.  Beth-Millo,  Arumah, 
Thebez,  are  named  as  amongst  the  dependent  cities. 
The  Temple2  itself  was  a  fortress,3  containing  the 
Sacred  Treasury.4 

Over  this  entangled  system,  Abimelech,  the  Bram¬ 
ble  King,  undertook  to  rule.  He  himself  seems  to 
have  lived  at  one  of  the  lesser  towns  of  the  league, 
Arumah,5  leaving  his  vicegerent,  Zebul,  to  govern  his 
unruly  kinsmen  of  Shechem.  Zebul  took  advantage 

in  the  tribe  of  Benjamin  (the  modern  12  ;  and  the  ruffians  of  Gibeah,  Judg. 
Bireh),  or  Baalath-Beer,  in  Judah.  xx.  5.  (See  Diet,  of  Bible ,  i.  146.) 

l  Baali- Shechem,  translated  “  men  2  See  Lecture  XIII.,  and  compare 

of  Shechem.”  It  is  thus  used  of  Jer-  the  parallel  case  of  Jupiter  Latiaris 

icho,  Josh.  li.  4;  xxiv.  11:  and  of  at  Rome. 

Uriah  the  Hittite,  2  Sam.  xi.  26.  The  3  Judg.  ix.  46. 

word  elsewhere  is  only  applied  to  the  4  Ibid.  ix.  4. 

warriors  of  Jabesh-Gilead,  2  Sam.  xxi.  5  Ibid.  ix.  41. 


390 


GIDEON. 


Lect.  XY. 


of  the  disorganized  state  of  the  country  to  place 
troops  of  banditti  along  the  tops  of  the  neighboring 
Fal,  of  mountains  to  plunder  the  travellers  through 
Abimeiech.  Central  Palestine.  It  was  in  the  midst  of 
this  union  of  despotism  and  anarchy,  that  the  Feast 
of  the  Vintage  —  chief  among  the  festivals  of  Pales¬ 
tine —  came  on,  with  the  usual  religious  pomp  and 
merriment 1  with  which  it  was  celebrated  in  the  Jew¬ 
ish  Church  during  the  Feast  of  Tabernacles ;  but  at 
Shechem,  in  the  precincts  of  the  God  of  the  League. 
In  a  population  thus  excited,  the  words  of  a  native 
Shechemite  fell  with  still  greater  force  than  those  of 
Abimeiech  himself  at  the  commencement  of  what  may 
be  called  this  movement  of  the  oppressed  nationality.2 
He  pointed  out  to  them  that  Abimeiech  was  but  half 
a  kinsman,  —  “Is  he  not  the  son  of  Jerubbaal?” — 
and  called  upon  them  to  choose  their  own  native 
rulers,  —  “Serve  the  men  of  Hamor  the  father  of 
“  Shechem ;  why  should  we  serve  him  ?  ” 

Zebul  gives  the  alarm.  By  three  desperate  on¬ 
slaughts  the  insurrection  is  quelled.  In  the  first,  we 
see  the  troops  of  Abimeiech  stealing  over  the  moun¬ 
tain-tops  at  break  of  day,  by  the  well-known  tere¬ 
binth,  and  by  some  sacred  spot  called  “  the  navel  of 
the  land.”  In  the  second,  the  main  battle  is  fought 
in  the  wide  cornfields  at  the  opening  of  the  valley 
of  Shechem.3  This  ends  in  the  rout  of  the  native 
party,  now  deprived  of  their  chief,  and  the  total  de¬ 
struction  of  the  city  of  Shechem,  to  appear  no  more 
again  till  the  time  of  the  monarchy.  In  the  third 
and  last  conflict,  the  remnant  of  the  insurgents  takes 
refuge  in  the  lofty  tower  in  the  stronghold  of  the 

1  Judg.  ix.  27.  3  “  The  field”  Judg.  ix.  42-44. 

2  Ibid.  28.  Ewald,  ii.  335. 


Lect.  XV. 


THE  FALL  OF  ABIMELECII. 


391 


Temple  of  the  League.  Not  far  off  was  the  moun¬ 
tain  of  Zalmon,1  famous  in  the  winter  for  its  snow, 
in  the  summer  for  its  shady  forests.  Thither  the 
new  king,  with  an  energy  worthy  of  his  father,  led 
his  followers,  axe  in  hand.  Like  a  common  wood¬ 
cutter,  he  hewed  down  a  bough  and  threw  it  over 
his  shoulder.  The  whole  band  followed  the  royal 
example ;  and  in  the  smoke  and  flames  kindled  round 
the  fortress,  the  insurgents  perished.  One  other  strong¬ 
hold  of  the  mutiny  remained,  —  a  similar  fortress  at 
Thebez ; 2  and  there,  too,  the  same  expedient  was  tried. 
Men  and  women  alike,  as  at  Shechem,  were  crowded 
within  the  tower,  and  mounted  to  the  top.  From 
this  eminence  they  commanded  a  full  view  of  the 
besiegers;  and  when  the  fearless  king  ran  close  to 
the  gate  to  fire  it  with  his  own  hands,  one  of  the 
women  above  seized  her  opportunity  and  dashed 
upon  his  head  a  fragment  of  a  millstone.  He  fell; 
but  in  his  fall  remembered  the  dignity  of  himself 
and  of  his  race;  and,  like  his  next  successor  in  the 
regal  office,  invoked  the  friendly  sword  of  his  armor- 
bearer  to  give  him  a  soldier’s  death.  In  this  violent 
end  of  a  noble  house,  the  nation  recognized  the 
Divine  Judgment  on  the  murderer  of  his  brothers; 
in  the  sweeping  destruction  of  the  ancient  Shechem, 
and  the  conflagration  of  its  famous  sanctuary,  was 
recognized  no  less  the  fulfilment  of  the  Curse  of 
Jotham.3  With  Ahimelech  expired  this  first  abortive 
attempt  at  monarchy.  In  the  obscure  rulers,  who 
follow,  the  same  tendency  is  still  perceptible.  Jair 

1  Zalmon,  “  shady,”  Judg.  ix.  48  ;  Tubas ,  on  a  mound  among  the  hills, 

Ps.  lxviii.  15  (misspelt  Salmon).  ten  miles  N.  E.  of  Nablus. 

2  Judg.  ix.  50.  Thebez  probably  3  Judg.  ix.  56,  57. 
survives  in  the  modern  village  of 

O 


392 


GIDEON. 


Lect.  XV 


and  Ibzan  cause  their  state  to  descend  to  the  nu¬ 
merous  sons  of  their  wives  or  concubines;  and  the 
dignity  of  Abdon  reaches  even  to  his  grandsons.1 
But  the  true  King  of  Israel  is  still  far  in  the  dis¬ 
tance. 


1  Judg.  x.  9 ;  xii.  9-14. 


Lect.  XVI. 


JEPHTHAH  AND  SAMSON. 


393 


t 


LECTURE  XVI. 

JEPHTHAH  AND  SAMSON. 

As  Gideon  is  the  highest  pitch  of  greatness  to 
which  this  period  reaches,  Jephthah  and  Samson  are 
the  lowest  points  to  which  it  descends.  In  them,  in 
different  forms,  the  violence  of  the  age  breaks  out 
most  visibly. 

I.  Jephthah  is  the  wild,  lawless  freebooter.  His  ir¬ 
regular  birth,  in  the  half-civilized  tribes  he-  Jephthah. 
yond  the  Jordan,  is  the  key-note  to  his  life.  The 
whole  scene  is  in  those  pastoral  uplands.  Not  Bethel, 
or  Shiloh,  but  Mizpeh,  the  ancient  watch-tower  which 
witnessed  the  parting  of  Jacob  and  Laban,  is  the  place 
of  meeting.  Ammon,  the  ancient  ally  of  Israel  against 
Og>  is  the  assailant.  The  war  springs  out  of  the  dis¬ 
putes  of  that  first  settlement.  The  battle  sweeps  over 
the  whole  tract  of  forest  from  Gilead  to  the  borders 
of  Moab.1  The  quarrel  which  arises  after  the  The  Trans_ 
battle  between  the  Transjordanic  tribe  and  the  Character  of 
proud  western  Ephraimites,  is  embittered  by the  quarre1' 
the  recollection  of  taunts  and  quarrels,  then,  no  doubt, 
full  of  gall  and  wormwood,  now  hardly  intelligible. 
“  Fugitives  of  Ephraim  are  ye  :  Gilead  is  among  the 
“  Ephraimites  and  among  the  Manassites.”  Was  it,  as 

l  “  From  Aroer  ” — to  the  “Meadow  intervening  links  are  lost  in  a  hopeless 
of  the  Vineyards,”  Judg.  xi.  33.  The  confusion  of  the  text. 

50 


394 


JEPHTHAH. 


Lect.  XVI, 


Ewald  conjectures/  some  allusion  to  the  lost  history 
of  the  days  when  the  half  tribe  of  Manasseh  separated 
from  its  Western  brethren?  If  it  was,  the  Gileadites 
had  now  their  turn,  —  “the  fugitives  of  the  Ephraim- 
ites,”  as  they  are  called  in  evident  allusion  to  the  for¬ 
mer  taunt,  are  caught  in  their  flight  at  the  fords  of  the 
Jordan,  the  scene  of  their  victory  over  the  Midianites, 
and  ruthlessly  slain.  The  test  put  to  them  was  a  word 
of  which  the  very  meaning  is  now  doubtful,  but  which, 
familiar  then  from  its  allusion  to  the  “  harvests  ”  or 
“floods”2  of  Palestine,  has  revived  in  the  warfare  of 
Shib_  Christian  controversy,  Shibboleth.  Many  a  party 

boieth.  watchword,  many  a  theological  test  has  had 
no  better  origin  than  this  difference  of  pronunciation 
between  the  two  rough  tribes,  which  has  thus  appro¬ 
priately  become  the  type  and  likeness  of  all  of  them. 

In  the  savage  taunt  of  Jephthah  to  the  Ephraimites, 
compared  with  the  mild  reply  of  Gideon  to  the  same 
insolent  tribe,  we  have  a  measure  of  the  inferiority  of 
Eastern  to  Western  Palestine,  —  of  the  degree  to  which 
Jephthah  sank  below  his  age,  and  Gideon  rose  above 
it.  But  in  his  own  country,  as  well  as  in  the  Church 
at  large,  it  is  the  other  part  of  J ephthah’s  story  which 
The  vow.  has  been  most  keenly  remembered.  The  fatal 
vow  at  the  battle  of  Aroer  belongs  naturally  to  the 
spasmodic  efforts  of  the  age ;  like  the  vows  of  Samson 
or  Saul  in  the  Jewish  Church  of  this  period,  or  of 
Clovis  or  Bruno  in  the  Middle  Ages.  But  its  literal 
execution  could  hardly  have  taken  place  had  it  been 
undertaken  by  any  one  more  under  the  moral  re¬ 
straints,  even  of  that  lawless  age,  than  the  freebooter 

1  Ewald,  ii.  419,  on  Judg.  xii.  4.  are  Gilead  in  the  midst  of  Ephraim 
This  is  almost  equally  the  case  if  we  and  in  the  midst  of  Manasseh.” 
adopt  the  version  of  the  LXX. — “Ye  2  Both  explanations  are  given  of 

Shibboleth.  Judg.  xii.  6. 

O 


Lect.  XVI. 


HIS  VOW. 


395 


Jephthah,  nor  in  any  other  part  of  the  Holy  Land 
than  that  separated  by  the  Jordan  valley  from  the 
more  regular  institutions  of  the  country.  Moab  and 
Ammon,  the  neighboring  tribes  to  Jephthah’s  native 
country,  were  the  parts  of  Palestine  where  human 
sacrifice  lingered  longest.  It  was  the  first  thought  of 
Balak  in  the  extremity  of  his  terror.1  It  was  the  last 
expedient  of  Balak’s  successor  in  the  war  with  Jehosh- 
aphat.2  Moloch,  to  whom  even  before  they  entered 
Palestine  the  Israelites  had  offered  human  sacrifices,3 
and  who  is  always  spoken  of  as  the  deity  who  was  thus 
honored,  was  especially  the  God  of  Ammon.  It  is  but 
natural  that  a  desperate  soldier  like  Jephthah,  breath¬ 
ing  the  same  atmosphere,  physical  and  social,  should 
make  the"  same  vow,  and  having  made  it,  adhere  to 
it.  There  was  no  High  Priest  or  Prophet  at  Xhe  Sacri_ 
hand  to  rebuke  it.  They  were  far  away  in  fice‘ 
the  hostile  tribe  of  Ephraim.  He  did  what  was  right 
in  his  own  eyes,  and  as  such  the  transaction  is  de¬ 
scribed.  Mostly  it  is  but  an  inadequate  account  to 
give  of  these  doubtful  acts  to  say  that  they  are  men¬ 
tioned  in  the  Sacred  narrative  without  commendation. 
Often  where  no  commendation  is  expressly  given,  it 
is  distinctly  implied.  But  here  the  story  itself  trem¬ 
bles  with  the  mixed  feeling  of  the  action.  The  de¬ 
scription  of  Jephthah’s  wild  character  prepares  us  for 
some  dark  catastrophe.  The  admiration  for  his  hero¬ 
ism  and  that  of  his  daughter  struggles  for  mastery 
in  the  historian  with  indignation  at  the  dreadful  deed. 
He  is  overwhelmed  by  the  natural  grief  of  a  father. 
“  Oh !  oh !  my  daughter,  thou  hast  crushed  me,  thou 
“  hast  crushed  me !  ”  She  rises  at  once  to  the  gran¬ 
deur  of  her  situation  as  the  instrument  whereby  the 

2  2  Kings  iii.  27.  3  Ezek.  xx.  26  ;  Jer.  xlix.  1. 


l  Micali  vi.  7. 


396 


JEPHTHAH. 


Lect.  XYL 


victory  had  been  won.  If  the  fatal  word  had  escaped 
his  lips  she  was  content  to  die,  “  forasmuch  as  the 
“Lord  hath  taken  vengeance  of  thee  upon  thine  ene- 
“  mies,  even  the  children  of  Ammon.”  It  is  one  of 
the  points  in  Sacred  History  where,  as  before  said, 
the  likeness  of  classical  times  mingles  with  the  He¬ 
brew  devotion.  It  recalls  to  us  the  story  of  Idome- 
neus  and  his  son,  of  Agamemnon  and  Ipliigenia.  And 
still  more  closely  do  we  draw  near,  as  our  attention 
is  fixed  on  the  Jewish  maiden,  to  a  yet  more  pathetic 
scene.  Her  grief  is  the  exact  anticipation  of  the 
lament  of  Antigone,  sharpened  by  the  peculiar  horror 
of  the  Hebrew  women  at  a  childless  death,  —  descend¬ 
ing  with  no  bridal  festivity,  with  no  nuptial  torches 
to  the  dark  chambers  of  the  grave  — 

o)  rvpfiog,  w  vvp&elov,  <j  KaraaKa^g 
olurjcig  u£i(j>povpog,  ol  Tropevopai  .  .  . 
nal  vvv  ay£L  pe  dia  x^Puv  ovtcj  ?m{3o)v 
uXeKTpov,  uvvpevaiov,  ovre  tov  yupov 
pipog  Mxovaav,  ovre  ncude'iov  rpotpjjg.1 


Into  the  mountains  of  Gilead  she  retires  for  two 
months,  —  plunging 2  deeper  and  deeper  into  the  gorges 
of  the  mountains,  to  bewail  her  lot,  with  the  maidens 
who  had  come  out  with  her  to  greet  the  returning 
conqueror.  Then  comes  the  awful  end,  from  which 
the  sacred  writer,  as  it  were,  averts  his  eyes.  “He 
did  with  her  according  to  his  vow.”  In  her  the 
house  of  Jephthah  became  extinct.  “  She  knew  no 
man.”  But  for  years  afterwards,  even  to  the  verge 
of  the  monarchy,  the  dark  deed  was  commemorated. 
Four  days  in  every  year  the  maidens  of  Israel  went 
up  into  the  mountains  of  Gilead,  —  and  here  the  He¬ 
brew  language  lends  itself  to  the  ambiguous  feeling 

1  Soph.  Ant.  890.  2  Judg.  xi.  38  (Hebrew). 


Lect.  XVI. 


HIS  VOW. 


39T 


of  the  narrative  itself,  —  “  to  praise  ” 1  or  “  to  lament  ” 
“the  daughter  of  Jephthah  the  Gileadite.’, 

The  record  which  thus  transparently  represents  the 
wavering  thought  of  the  Sacred  Historian  has  re¬ 
ceived  also  the  reflections  of  the  successive  stages  of 
feeling  with  which  the  Church  has  subsequently  re¬ 
garded  the  act.  As  far  back  as  we  can  trace  the 
sentiment  of  those  who  read  the  passage,  in  Jonathan 
the  Targumist,  and  Josephus,  and  through  the  whole 
of  the  first  eleven  centuries  of  Christendom,  the  story 
was  taken  in  its  literal  sense  as  describing  the  death 
of  the  maiden,  although  the  attention  of  the  Church 
was,  as  usual,  diverted  to  distant  allegorical  Expiana- 

.  °  tions  of  the 

meanings.  Then,  it  is  said,  from  a  polemical  Sacrifice, 
bias  of  Kimchi,  arose  the  interpretation  that  she  was 
not  killed,  but  immured  in  celibacy.  From  the  Jewish 
theology  this  spread  to  the  Christian.  By  this  time 
the  notion  had  sprung  up  that  every  act  recorded  in 
the  Old  Testament  was  to  be  defended  according  to 
the  standard  of  Christian  morality;  and,  accordingly, 
the  process  began  of  violently  wresting  the  words  of 
Scripture  to  meet  the  preconceived  fancies  of  later 
ages.  In  this  way  entered  the  hypothesis  of  Jeph- 
thah’s  daughter  having  been  devoted  as  a  nun ;  con¬ 
trary  to  the  plain  meaning  of  the  text,  contrary  to 
the  highest  authorities  of  the  Church,  contrary  to  all 
the  usages  of  the  old  Dispensation.  In  modern  times, 

1  Judg.  xi.  40.  notare  veraciter”),  follows  an  expla- 

2  After  a  reasonable  exposition,  by  nation  of  Jephthah  as  “  opener  ”  (“  He 
Augustine  (IH.  Part  i.  613),  of  the  opened  their  hearts”);  the  land  of 
general  commendation  implied  in  Heb.  Tob  (“  good  ”  —  the  land  of  the  resur- 
xi.  32,  33,  Judg.  xi.  39,  as  compatible  rection)  ;  his  daughter,  “the  Church;  ” 
with  great  faults  (“  Sacra  Scriptura  60  days,  the  6  ages ;  4  days,  the  4 
quorum  fidem  et  justitiam  veraciter  quarters  of  the  world ;  42,000  Eph- 
laudat,  non  hineimpeditureorum  etiam  raimites,  6  times  7;  and  Jephthah’s 
Deccata,siquanoritetoporterejudicet,  6  years,  also  the  6  ages. 


398 


JEPHTHAH. 


Lect.  XVI 


a  more  careful  study  of  the  Bible  has  brought  us 
back  to  the  original  sense.  And  with  it  returns  the 
deep  pathos  of  the  original  story,  and  the  lesson  which 
it  reads  of  the  heroism  of  the  father  and  the  daugh¬ 
ter,  to  be  admired  and  loved,  in  the  midst  of  the 
fierce  superstitions  across  which  it  plays  like  a  sun¬ 
beam  on  a  stormy  sea. 

So  regarded,  it  may  still  be  remembered  with  a  sym¬ 
pathy  at  least  as  great  as  is  given  to  the  heathen 
immolations,  just  cited,  which  awaken  a  sentiment  of 
compassion  wherever  they  are  known.  The  sacrifice 
of  Jephthah’s  daughter,  taking  it  at  its  worst,  was  not 
a  human  sacrifice  in  the  gross  sense  of  the  word  — 
not  a  slaughter  of  an  unwilling  victim,  as  when  the 
Gaul  and  Greek  were  buried  alive  in  the  Roman  Fo¬ 
rum  ;  but  the  willing  offering  of  a  devoted  heart,  to 
free,  as  she  supposed,  her  father  and  her  country  from 
a  terrible  obligation.  It  was,  indeed,  as  Josephus  says, 
an  act  in  itself  hateful  to  God.  But,  nevertheless,  it 
contained  just  that  one  redeeming  feature  of  pure  obe¬ 
dience  and  love,  which  is  the  distinguishing  mark  of 
all  true  Sacrifice,  and  which  communicates  to  the  whole 
story  those  elements  of  tenderness  and  nobleness  well 
drawn  out  of  it  by  two  modern  poets,  to  each  of  whom, 
in  their  different  ways,  may  be  applied  what  was  said 
by  Goethe  of  the  first,  —  that  at  least  one  function 
committed  to  him  was  that  of  giving  life  and  form  to 
the  incidents  and  characters  of  the  Old  Testament. 

“  Though  the  virgins  of  Salem  lament, 

Be  the  judge  and  the  hero  unbent ; 

I  have  won  the  great  battle  for  thee, 

And  my  father  and  country  are  free. 

“  When  this  blood  of  thy  giving  has  gush’d, 

When  the  voice  that  thou  lovest  is  hushed, 


Lect.  XVI. 


HIS  VOW. 


399 


Let  my  memory  still  be  thy  pride, 

And  forget  not  I  smiled  as  I  died/’ 1 

Or,  in  the  still  more  exact  language  of  the  more  re¬ 
cent  poet  — 

“  The  daughter  of  the  warrior  Gileadite, 

A  maiden  pure  ;  as  when  she  went  along 
From  Mizpeh’s  tower’d  gate  with  radiance  light 
With  timbrel  and  with  song. 

•  •  •  •  • 

44  4  My  God,  my  land,  my  father  —  these  did  move 
‘  Me  from  my  bliss  of  life,  that  Nature  gave, 

‘  Lower’d  softly  with  a  threefold  cord  of  love, 

4  Down  to  a  silent  grave. 

44  4  And  I  went  mourning,’  4  No  fair  Hebrew  boy 
4  Shall  smile  away  my  maiden  blame  among 
4  The  Hebrew  mothers  ;  ’  emptied  of  all  joy, 

4  Leaving  the  dance  and  song, 

44  4  Leaving  the  olive-gardens  far  below, 

4  Leaving  the  promise  of  my  bridal  bower, 

4  The  valleys  of  grape-loaded  vines  that  glow 
4  Beneath  the  battled  tower. 


44  4  When  the  next  moon  was  roll’d  into  the  sky, 

4  Strength  came  to  me,  that  equall’d  my  desire  — 

4  How  beautiful  a  thing  it  was  to  die 
4  For  God  and  for  my  sire ! 

'4  4  It  comforts  me  in  this  one  thought  to  dwell, 

4  That  I  subdued  me  to  my  father’s  will ; 

4  Because  the  kiss  he  gave  me,  ere  I  fell, 

4  Sweetens  the  spirit  stilL 

t  «  •  •  • 

44  4  Moreover,  it  is  written  that  my  race 

4  Hew’d  Ammon,  hip  and  thigh,  from  Aroer 
4  On  Arnon  unto  Minnith.’  ”  .  .  .2 

II.  From  the  lawlessness  of  Jephthah  on  the  ex¬ 
treme  eastern  frontier  of  Palestine,  we  pass  to  Samson. 

1  Lord  Byron’s  Hebrew  Melodies.  2  Tennyson’s  Poems ,  197. 


400 


SAMSON. 


Lect.  XVI 


a  manifestation  of  the  same  tendency  in  a  different, 
but  not  less  incontestable  form,  on  the  extreme  west¬ 
ern  frontier.  At  the  same  time  the  new  enemies,  in 
whose  grasp  we  now  find  the  Israelites,  remind  us  that 
we  are  approaching  a  new  epoch  in  their  history; 
that  which  is  to  close  the  period  on  which  we  are 
now  engaged. 

“  The  Philistines  ”  present  themselves  to  our  notice, 

The  Phi-  if  not  absolutely  for  the  first  time,  yet  for  the 
listmes.  £rg£  £*me  ag  a  p0werfui  and  hostile  nation. 

In  the  original  conquest  by  Joshua,  they  are  hardly 
mentioned.  Their  name  appears  to  indicate  their  late 
arrival,  —  u  the  Strangers ;  ” 1  and  the  scattered  indica¬ 
tions  of  their  origin  lead  to  the  conclusion  that  they 
were  settlers  from  some  foreign  country,  from  Asia 
Minor  and  its  adjacent  islands,  probably  from  Crete.2 

With  this  agree  the  notices  of  their  character  and 
pursuits.  Like  the  Cretans,  they  were  employed  as 
mercenaries.  Like  the  Cretans,  too,  they  were  distin¬ 
guished  amongst  the  marauding  tribes  for  the  strength 
and  variety  of  their  armor.  The  most  complete  vo¬ 
cabulary  of  arms  that  exists  in  the  Old  Testament  is 
taken  from  the  panoply  of  a  Philistine  warrior.3  Un¬ 
like  the  rest  of  the  inhabitants  of  Canaan,  they  were 


1  The  LXX.  throughout  the  Pen¬ 
tateuch  and  Joshua  keep  the  Hebrew 
word  $v?aoTiet(j.,  but  in  all  the  sub¬ 
sequent  books  translate  it  aKkotyvkot 
“  aliens.”  Comp.  alAoTptav,  Heb.  xi. 
34.  (Ewald,  i.  292-294.) 

2  In  Gen.  x.  14, 1  Chron.  i.  12,  they 
are  derived,  together  with  Caphtorim, 
from  Casluhim,  son  of  Mizraim  ;  and 
in  Amos  ix.  7,  Deut.  ii  23,  Jer.  xlvii. 
4,  from  Caphtor.  Caplitor  by  the 

LXX.  is  rendered  Cappadocia.  But 
probably  the  country  directly  or  in¬ 


directly  intended  is  Crete.  Cherethite 
and  Philistine ,  in  Zeph.  ii.  5,  Ezek. 
xxv.  16,  1  Sam.  xxx.  14,  and  appar¬ 
ently  2  Sam.  xx.  23,  2  Kings  xi.  4, 
19,  are  used  as  synonymous  terms; 
and  this  is  confirmed  not  only  by  the 
characteristics  mentioned  in  the  text, 
but  by  the  confused  statement  of  Ta¬ 
citus  that  the  Jews  themselves  came 
from  Crete  (Hist.  v.  2),  and  by  the 
name  of  Minoa  given  to  Gaza  (Steph. 
Byz.). 

3  1  Sam.  xvii.  5-7. 


Lect.  XVI. 


THE  PHILISTINES. 


401 


uncircumcised,  and  appear  to  have  stood  on  a  lower 
level  of  civilization.  They  were  almost,  it  may  be  said, 
the  laughing-stock  of  their  livelier  and  quicker  neigh¬ 
bors,  from  their  dull,  heavy  stupidity;  the  easy  prey 
of  the  rough  humor  of  Samson,  or  the  agility  and  cun¬ 
ning  of  the  diminutive  David. 

The  older  Avites  whom  they  dispossessed,  probably 
occupied  the  southern  part  of  the  country,1  generally 
called  in  the  Patriarchal  History  “  the  valley  of  Gerar.” 
Possibly  the  Philistines  may  have  been  called  in  by 
them  as  allies  against  the  invading  Israelites,  and  then, 
as  in  the  ancient  fable,2  made  themselves  their  mas¬ 
ters.  Possibly,  also,  they  may  have  become  so  closely 
incorporated  with  them,  as  to  produce  that  interchange 
of  names  which,  in  some  of  the  Sacred  Books,3  has 
identified  the  earlier  with  the  later  race.  The  gigan¬ 
tic  stature,  too,  which  marks  some  of  the  Philistine 
families,  may  have  arisen  from  their  connection  with 
the  aboriginal  giants,  who  fingered  in  the  maritime 
plains4  after  their  expulsion  from  the  nations. 

In  these  maritime  plains,  the  “  Shefela  ” 5  or  a  Low 
Country ,”  as  it  was  called,  on  the  south-west  of  Ca¬ 
naan,  was  their  original  seat  after  their  first  settle¬ 
ment  ;  and  in  this  situation  lay  their  security,  as  that 
of  the  northern  Phoenicians,  against  the  mountain  in¬ 
fantry  of  Israel.  Chariots  and  horses  with  them,  as 
with  their  Phoenician  neighbors  on  the  north,  and 
their  Egyptian  neighbors  on  the  south,  formed  their 
chief  strength.  Unlike  the  Phoenicians,  they  were 
indisposed  to  commerce.  Of  the  three  possible  har¬ 
bors  on  their  unbroken  fine  of  sandy  coast  near 

1  Deut.  ii.  23 ;  Josh.  xiii.  3.  2  Comp.  Ewald,  i.  310. 

3  As  in  Gen.  xxi.  34,  xxvi.  18 ;  Ex.  4  Josh.  xi.  22. 

xv.  14  ;  xiii.  17.  5  Sinai  and  Palestine ,  256. 


51 


402 


SAMSON. 


Lect.  XVI, 


Gaza,  Ascalon,  and  Jabneel,  they  made  no  use.  The 
only  traces  of  their  maritime 1  origin  and  situation  were 
to  be  found  in  their  worship.  The  chief  deity  was 
the  fish  god  Dagon,2  whose  image  was  that  of  the 
trunk  of  a  fish  with  the  head  and  hands  of  a  man. 
Some  slight  indications  of  the  architecture  of  his  chief 
temple  are  given,  its  door-way,3  and  its  two  massive 
pillars,  supporting  the  roof  and  standing  sufficiently 
close  together  to  be  embraced  at  once.4  The  traces 
of  his  worship  were  scattered  throughout  the  country ; 
in  the  numerous  “  houses  of  Dagon,” 5  of  which  the 
names  still  linger  in  different  parts  of  the  south  of 
Palestine.  A  similar  form  was  ascribed  to  the  female 
divinity,  Derceto,6  who  in  their  mythology  took  the 
place  of  Astarte.  The  only  other  special  deity  of  the 
Philistines  known  to  us,  is  Baal-Zebub,7  “the  Lord  of 
“  the  Flies,”  who  had  a  sanctuary  in  Ekron,  as  Dagon 
and  Derceto  had  theirs  in  Ashdod,  Gaza,  and  Ascalon.8 
These,  with  Gath,  formed  the  original  federation  of 
the  nation ;  each  raised  on  its  slight  eminence  above 
the  plain,  and  ruled  by  its  own  king  or  prince.  Their 
main  support,  and  the  main  value  of  their  country, 
lay  in  the  vast  corn-fields,  which  almost  without  a 
break  reached  from  the  sandy  shore  to  the  foot  of 
the  Judaean  hills ;  and  which  even  to  the  Israelites 
furnished  a  resource  in  case  of  famine.9  Such  were 
the  Philistines,  the  longest  and  deadliest  enemies  of 
the  Chosen  People,  whose  hostilities,  commencing  in 


1  In  the  LXX.  version  of  1  Sam. 
v.  6,  it  is  said  that  “  the  hand  of  the 
Lord  brake  out  against  their  ships.” 
But  this  may  be  a  misreading. 

2  1  Sam.  v.  4.  The  word  is  the 
same  as  in  the  river  Tagus. 

3  1  Sam.  v.  5. 

4  Judg.  xvi.  25-29. 


5  Josh.  xv.  41  ;  and  see  Diet,  of 
Bible ,  “  Beth-Dagon.” 

6  Diod.  Sie.  ii.  4. 

7  2  Kings  i.  2-16. 

8  Judg.  xvi.  23;  1  Chron.  x.  10; 
1  Macc.  x.  84. 

9  2  Kings  viii.  2. 


Lect.  XVI. 


AS  A  NAZARITE. 


403 


the  close  of  the  period  of  the  Judges,  lasted  through 
the  two  first  reigns  of  the  monarchy,  and  were  not 
finally  extinguished  till  the  time  of  Hezekiah,1  and 
who  yet,  by  a  singular  chance,  have,  through  the  con¬ 
tact  of  the  Western  world  with  their  strip  of  coast> 
succeeded  in  giving  their  own  name  of  u  Philistia  ” 
or  “  Palestine/’ 2  properly  confined  within  that  narrow 
strip,  to  the  whole  country  occupied  by  Israel. 

Of  all  the  tribes  of  Israel,  that  on  which  these  new 
comers  pressed  most  heavily  was  the  small  tribe  of 
Dan,  already  straitened  between  the  mountains  and  the 
sea,  and  communicating  with  its  seaport  Joppa  only  by 
passing  through  the  Philistine  territory.  Out  of  this 
tribe,  accordingly,  the  deliverer  came.  It  was  Birth  of 
in  Zorah,3  planted  on  a  high  conical  hill  over-  Samson- 
looking  the  plain,  which  from  its  peculiar  relation  to 
these  hills  was  called  “  the  root  of  Dan,” 4  that  the 
birth  of  the  child  took  place,  who  was  by  a  double 
tie  connected  with  the  history  of  this  peculiar  period, 
as  the  first  conqueror  of  the  Philistines,  and  as  the 
first  recorded  instance  of  a  Nazarite.  In  both  respects 
he  was  the  beginner  of  that  work  which  a  far  greater 
than  he,  the  Prophet  Samuel,  carried  to  a  completion. 
But  what  in  Samuel  were  but  subordinate  functions, 
in  Samson  were  supreme,  and  in  him  were  further 
united  with  an  eccentricity  of  character  and  career 
that  gives  him  an  absolutely  singular  position  amongst 
the  Israelite  heroes. 

It  was,  as  we  have  remarked,  the  age  of  vows,  and 
it  is  implied  in  the  account  that  such  special  The  Naza_ 
vows  as  that  which  marked  the  life  of  Sam-  ntes' 

1  2  Kings  xviii.  8.  listia.  (See  Palestine,  in  Diet,  of 

2  “  Palestine  ”  was  the  Gentile  Bible.) 

name  for  the  Holy  Land.  In  the  3  Robinson,  B.  R.  iii.  153. 

A.  V.  it  is  always  used  for  Phi-  4  See  Sinai  and  Palestine,  278. 


404 


SAMSON. 


Lect.  XVI. 


son  were  common.  The  order  of  Nazarites,  which 
we  find  actually  described  in  the  code  of  the  Mosaic 
Law,  was  already  in  existence.  It  was  the  nearest 
approach  to  a  monastic  institution  that  the  Jewish 
Church  contained.1  It  was,  as  its  name  implies,  a  sep¬ 
aration  from  the  rest  of  the  nation,  partly  by  the  ab¬ 
stinence  from  all  intoxicating  drink,  partly  by  the 
retention  of  the  savage  covering  of  long  flowing 
tresses  of  hair.  The  order  thus  begun  continued  to 
the  latest  times.  Not  only  was  Samuel  thus  devoted, 
but  Elijah  in  outward  appearance  was  under  the  same 
rule;  in  the  time  of  Amos,  there  was  a  flourishing 
institution  of  Nazarites ; 2  and  at  the  very  close  of  the 
Jewish  Church  there  were  at  least  two  who  bore  in 
their  habits  and  aspect  the  likeness  of  the  earliest  of 
these  ascetics  —  John,3  the  son  of  Zachariah,  the  aus¬ 
tere  preacher  in  the  wilderness,  and  Jacob,  or  James,4 
the  Bishop  of  the  Christian  Church  at  Jerusalem.  It 
was  as  the  first  fruits  of  this  institution,  no  less  than 
as  his  country’s  champion,  that  the  birth  of  Samson 
is  ushered  in  with  a  solemnity  of  inauguration  which, 
whether  we  adopt  the  more  coarse  and  literal  repre¬ 
sentation  of  Josephus,5  or  the  more  shadowy  and  re¬ 
fined  representation  of  the  Sacred  narrative,  seems  to 
announce  the  coming  of  a  greater  event  than  that 
which  is  comprised  in  the  merely  warlike  career  of 
the  conqueror  of  the  Philistines. 

Wherever  the  son  of  Manoah  appeared  in  later  life, 
Hisaus-  he  was  always  known  by  the  Nazarite  mark, 
tenty.  Like  the  Merovingian  kings,  whose  long  tresses 

1  See  Ewald,  Alterthumer ,  97,  &c.  sents  “  the  angel  ”  or  “man  of  God  ” 

a  Amos  ii.  11.  as  a  youth  of  transcendent  beauty,  who 

3  Luke  i.  15.  excites  the  frantic  jealousy  of  Ma- 

4  Hegesippus,  in  Euseb.  H.  E.  ii.  23.  noah. 

5  Josephus  (Ant.  v.  8,  §§  2, 3)  repre- 


Lect.  XVI. 


HIS  HUMOR. 


405 


were  the  sign  of  their  royal  race,  which  to  lose  was  to 
lose  royalty  itself,  — like  the  hierarchy  of  the  Eastern 
Church,  whose  long  beards  are  in  like  manner  the 
inalienable  sign  of  their  priestly  functions,  —  so  the 
early  vow  of  Samson’s  mother  was  always  testified  by 
his  shaggy,  untonsured  head,  and  by  the  seven  sweep¬ 
ing  locks,1  twisted  together,  yet  distinct,  which  hung 
over  his  shoulders  •  and  in  all  his  wild  wanderings  and 
excesses  amidst  the  vineyards  of  Sorek  and  Timnath 
he  is  never  reported  to  have  touched  the  juice  of 
one  of  their  abundant  grapes. 

But  these  were  his  only  indications  of  an  austere 
life.  It  is  one  of  the  many  distinctions  be-  His 
tween  the  manners  of  the  East  and  West,  be-  humor* 
tween  ancient  and  modern  forms  of  religious  feeling, 
that  the  character  of  the  J ewish  chief  who  most 
nearly  resembles  the  founder  of  a  monastic  order 
should  be  the  most  frolicsome,  irregular,  uncultivated 
creature,  that  the  nation  ever  produced.  Not  only 
was  celibacy  no  part  of  his  Nazarite  obligations,  but 
not  even  ordinary  purity  of  life.  He  was  full  of  the 
spirits  and  the  pranks,  no  less  than  of  the  strength, 
of  a  giant.  His  name,  which  Josephus  interprets  in 
the  sense  of  “  strong,”  was  still  more  characteristic. 
He  was  u  the  Sunny,”  —  the  bright  and  beaming, 
though  wayward  likeness  of  the  great  luminary  which 
the  Hebrews  delighted  to  compare  to  a  “  giant  rejoic¬ 
ing  to  run  his  course,”  “a  bridegroom  coming  forth 
“  out  of  his  chamber.” 2  Nothing  can  disturb  his 
radiant  good-humor.  His  most  valiant,  his  most  cruel 
actions,  are  done  with  a  smile  on  his  face,  and  a  jest 
in  his  mouth.  It  relieves  his  character  from  the  stern¬ 
ness  of  Phoenician  fanaticism.  As  a  peal  of  hearty 

1  Judg.  xvi.  13. 


2  Psalm  xix.  5. 


406 


SAMSON. 


Lect.  XYI. 


laughter  breaks  in  upon  the  despondency  of  indi¬ 
vidual  sorrow,  so  the  joviality  of  Samson  becomes  a 
pledge  of  the  revival  of  the  greatness  of  his  nation. 
It  is  brought  out  in  the  strongest  contrast  with  the 
brute  coarseness  and  stupidity  of  his  Philistine  enemies, 
here,  as  throughout  the  Sacred  History,  the  butt  of 
Israelitish  wit  and  Israelitish  craft. 

Look  at  his  successive  acts  in  this  light,  and  they 
assume  a  new  significance.  Out  of  his  first  achieve¬ 
ment  he  draws  the  materials  for  his  playful  riddle. 
His  second  and  third  achievements  are  practical  jests 
on  the  largest  scale.  The  mischievousness  of  the  con¬ 
flagration  of  the  corn-fields,  by  means  of  the  jackals, 
is  subordinate  to  the  ludicrousness  of  the  sight,  as, 
from  the  hill  of  Zorah,  the  contriver  of  the  scheme 
must  have  watched  the  streams  of  fire  spreading 
through  corn-fields  and  orchards  in  the  plain  below. 
The  whole  point  of  the  massacre  of  the  thousand 
Philistines  lies  in  the  cleverness  with  which  their 
clumsy  triumph  is  suddenly  turned  into  discomfiture, 
and  their  discomfiture  is  celebrated  by  the  punning 
turn  of  the  hero,  not  forgotten  even  in  the  exultation 
or  the  weariness  of  victory.  “  With  the  jawbone  of 
66  an  ass  have  I  slain  one  mass ,  two  masses  ;  with  the 
“  jawbone  of  an  ass  I  have  slain  an  onload  of  men.”1 
The  carrying  off  the  gates  of  Gaza  derives  all  its  force 
from  the  neatness  with  which  the  Philistine  watchmen 
are  outdone,2  on  the  very  spot  where  they  thought 
themselves  secure.  The  answers  with  which  he  puts 
off  the  inquisitiveness  of  Delilah  derive  their  vivacity 
from  the  quaintness  of  the  devices  which  he  suggests, 
and  the  ease  with  which  his  foolish  enemies  fall  into 

1  So  the  original  may  be  repre-  2  Judg.  xvi.  2,  3. 
sented  :  Judg.  xv.  16. 


Lect.  XYI. 


LOCAL  COLORING  OF  HIS  LIFE. 


407 


them,  trap  after  trap,  as  if  only  to  give  their  conqueror 
amusement.  The  closing  scenes  of  his  life  breathe, 
throughout,  the  same  terrible,  yet  grotesque  irony. 
When  the  captive  warrior  is  called  forth,  in  the  mer¬ 
riment  of  his  persecutors,  to  exercise  for  the  last  time 
the  well-known  raillery  of  his  character,  he  appears  as 
the  great  jester  or  buffoon  of  the  nation ;  the  word 
employed  expresses  alike  the  roars  of  laughter  and 
the  wild  gambols  with  which  he  "  made  them  sport ;  ” 
and  as  he  puts  forth  the  last  energy  of  his  vengeance, 
the  final  effort  of  his  expiring  strength,  it  is  in  a  stroke 
of  broad  and  savage  humor  that  his  indignant  spirit 
passes  away.  "  0  Lord  Jehovah,  remember  me  now ; 
"  and  strengthen  me  now,  only  this  once,  0  God,  that 
"  I  may  be  avenged  of  the  Philistines  ”  [not  for  both 
“  of  my  lost  eyes  —  but]  "  for  one  of  my  two  eyes.” 
That  grim  playfulness,  strong  in  death,  lends  its  par¬ 
adox  even  to  the  act  of  destruction  itself,  and  over¬ 
flows  into  the  touch  of  triumphant  satire  with  which 
the  pleased  historian  closes  the  story ;  “  The  dead 
"which  he  slew  at  his  death  were  more  than  they 
"  which  he  slew  in  his  life.” 

These  are  the  general  features  of  Samson’s  life.  The 
sudden  breaks  in  the  narrative,1  showing  more  Local  col- 
clearly  than  elsewhere  the  imperfect  state  in  hisni?fe° 
which  the  history  of  these  times  has  come  down  to 
us,  warn  us  off  from  a  too  close  scrutiny  of  its  de¬ 
tails.  But  there  is  no  portion  of  the  sacred  story 
more  stamped  with  a  peculiarly  local  color.  Unlike 
the  heroes  of  Grecian,  Celtic,  or  Teutonic  romance, 
whose  deeds  are  scattered  over  the  whole  country  or 
the  whole  continent  where  they  lived  —  Hercules,  or 

1  Such  are  the  gaps  between  Judg.  xiii.  24  and  25;  between  xv.  20  and 
xvi.  1.  (Ewald,  ii.  529,  &c.) 


408 


SAMSON. 


Lect.  XVI. 


Arthur,  or  Charlemagne,  —  the  deeds  of  Samson  are 
confined  to  that  little  corner  of  Palestine  in  which  was 
pent  up  the  fragment  of  the  tribe  to  which  he  be- 

Thecham-  longed.  He  is  the  one  champion  of  Dan.  To 
pion  of  Dan.  any  one?  must  be  the  reference  in 

the  blessing  of  Jacob ;  “  Dan  shall  judge  his  people 
as  one  of  the  tribes  of  Israel.”  In  his  biting  wit  and 
cunning  ambuscades,  which  baffled  the  horses  and 
chariots  of  Philistia,  must  probably  be  seen  “  the  ser- 
“  pent  by  the  way,  the  adder  in  the  path,  that  hiteth 
“  the  horse’s  heels,  so  that  his  rider  shall  fall  back- 
“  wards.” 1 

It  was  at  a  spot  well  known  in  the  history  of  his 
His  first  tribe  —  in  Mahaneh-Dan,  or  the  “  Camp  of 
S!m  Dan  ”  —  that  the  first  aspirations  of  his  career 
showed  themselves.  There,  underneath  the  mountains 
of  Judah,  the  little  band  which  broke  away  to  the 
north  at  the  commencement  of  this  stormy  period, 
had  pitched  their  first  encampment,2  and  there  also 
was  the  ancestral  burial-place  of  his  family.3  Amongst 
his  fathers’  tombs,  and  amidst  the  recollections  of 
his  fathers’  exploits,  “  the  Spirit  of  Jehovah  began  to 
“  move  him  ”  —  to  strike,  as  the  expression  implies, 
on  his  rough  nature4  as  on  a  drum  or  cymbal, 
till  it  resounded  like  a  gong  through  his  native 
hills. 

Then  began  what  were  literally  his  “descents”  of 

His  local  l°ve  and  of  war  upon  the  plain  of  Philistia 
exploits.  fr0m  Zorah  on  the  hills  above.  The  vines  on 

the  slopes  of  these  hills,  the  vineyards  of  Timnath 
and  of  Sorek,  were  famous  throughout  Palestine.  It 

1  Gen.  xlix.  16,  17.  3  Judg.  xvi.  31. 

2  Judg.  xiii.  25;  xviii.  12;  Josh.  4  Ibid.  xiii.  25  (Hebrew), 

xv.  33.  See  Lecture  XIII. 


Lect.  XVI. 


HIS  GRAVE. 


409 


was  probably  amongst  these,  as  the  maidens  whom 
the  Benjamites  surprised  amongst  the  vineyards  of 
Shiloh,  that  he  met  both  his  earliest  and  his  latest 
love.  The  names  of  the  surrounding  villages  bear 
traces  of  the  wild  animals  whom  he  encountered,  and 
used  as  instruments  of  his  great  exploits  —  Lebaoth 
(“  the  lionesses”),1  Shaalbim  (“the  jackals”),2  Zorah 
(“  the  hornets  ”).  The  corn-fields  of  Philistia  —  then, 
as  now,  interspersed  with  olive-groves,3  then,  also,  with 
vineyards  —  lay  stretched  in  one  unbroken  expanse 
before  him,  to  invite  his  facetious  outrage.  Once  he 
wandered  beyond  the  territory  of  his  own  tribe,  and 
that  of  his  enemies,  but  it  was  only  into  the  neigh¬ 
boring  hills  of  Judah.  In  some  deep  cleft,  such  as 
doubtless  could  easily  be  found  in  the  limestone  hills 
around  the  vale  of  Etam  (the  Wady  Urtas),  he  took 
refuge.  The  Philistines  then,  as  afterwards  in  David’s 
time,  had  planted  a  garrison  in  the  neighborhood.4 
The  lion  of  Judah  was  cowed  by  their  presence. 
“  Knowest  thou  not  the  Philistines  are  rulers  over 
us  ?  ”  Out  of  the  cleft  he  emerges,  and  sweeps  them 
away  with  the  rude  weapon  that  first  comes  to  hand. 
The  spring  and  the  rock  which  witnessed  the  deed,5 
though  now  lost,  were  long  pointed  out  as  memorials 
of  the  history.  The  scene  of  his  death  is  the  His  grave, 
great  Temple  of  the  Fish  God  at  Gaza,  in  the  ex¬ 
tremity  of  the  Philistine  district.  But  his  grave  was 

1  Josh.  xv.  32,  33  ;  Judg.  i.  35.  ,  fare  a  mortal  outrage.  (Burckhardt, 

2  It  is  said  that  jackals  exist,  or  did  331.) 

xist,  in  great  numbers,  in  the  plain  3  Judg.  xv.  5. 

f  Ramleh,  where  they  were  hunted  4  Judg.  xv.  7;  2  Sam.  xxiii.  14. 
down  and  thrown  into  the  sea.  (Has-  5  The  connection  between  the  story 
selquist,  115-277.)  To  set  fire  to  the  and  tlie  place  is  indicated  in  the  name 
aarvest  of  an  enemy  is  in  Arab  war-  “  Lehi,”  or  “  Jawbone,”  Judg.  xv.  9, 

15,  16,  17,  19. 


52 


410 


SAMSON. 


Lect.  XVI. 


in  the  same  spot  which  had  nourished  his  first  youth¬ 
ful  hopes.  From  the  time  of  Gideon  downwards,  the 
tombs  of  the  Judges  have  been  carefully  specified.  In 
no  case,  however,  does  the  specification  suggest  a  more 
pathetic  image,  than  in  the  description  of  the  funeral 
procession,  in  which  the  dead  hero  is  borne  by  his 
brothers  and  his  kinsmen,  “  up  ”  the  steep  ascent  to 
his  native  hills,  and  laid,  as  it  would  seem,  beside  the 
father  who  had  watched  with  pride  his  early  deeds, 
“  between  Zorah  and  Eshtaol,  in  the  burial-place  of 
Manoah  his  father.” 

The  arrangement  of  the  narrative  into  its  separate 
parts  —  the  manner  in  which  the  humor,  the  strength, 
the  headstrong  rashness  of  Samson  are  worked  up  to 
the  catastrophe  —  have  not  unnaturally  suggested  to 
the  great  Hebrew  critic  of  our  age  the  supposition 
that  the  story  may  even  in  early  times  have  been 
wrought  into  a  dramatic  poem.  But  it  is  a  remark¬ 
able  proof  of  the  latent  force  of  the  Biblical  history, 
that  a  series  of  incidents  and  characters  so  peculiarly 
local,  so  abruptly  and  faintly  depicted,  should  yet  have 
furnished  to  our  own  poet  the  materials  for  a  drama, 
which  not  only,  as  has  been  before  observed,  is  the 
best  likeness  in  modern  form  of  the  ancient  classical 
tragedies,  but  is  also,  beyond  any  other  of  his  works, 
interwoven  with  the  modern  experiences  of  his  own 
eventful  life. 

Even  in  Milton’s  earlier  days  he  seems  to  have 
Milton’s  dwelt  with  unusual  pleasure  on  the  gran- 
the  story,  deur  and  the  fall  of  Samson,  as  the  image  of 
what  he  most  admired  and  most  cherished  in  the 
troubled  world  of  English  politics ;  as  when  he  thinks 
that  he  “  sees  in  his  mind  a  noble  and  puissant  na¬ 
tion  rousing  herself  like  a  strong  man  after  sleep 


Lect.  XVI. 


MILTON’S  USE  OF  THE  STORY. 


411 


“  and  shaking  her  invincible  locks ;  ” 1  or  as  when,  in 
more  elaborate  style,  he  draws  out  the  fine  allegory, 
specially  suitable  to  his  own  times,  but,  with  slight  mod¬ 
ifications,  applicable  also  to  the  general  relations  of 
rulers  and  Churches :  —  “  I  cannot  better  liken  the 
“  state  and  person  of  a  king  than  to  that  mighty 
“  Nazarite,  Samson ;  who,  being  disciplined  from  his 
“  birth  in  the  precepts  and  the  practice  of  temper- 
“  ance  and  sobriety,  grows  up  to  a  noble  strength 
“  and  perfection,  with  those  his  illustrious  and  sunny 
“  locks,  the  Laws,  waving  and  curling  about  his  god- 
“  like  shoulders.  And,  while  he  keeps  them  undimin- 
“  ished  and  unshorn,  he  may  with  the  jawbone  of  an 
“  ass,  that  is,  with  the  word  of  his  meanest  officer, 
“  suppress  and  put  to  confusion  thousands  of  those 
“  that  rise  against  his  just  power.  But  laying  down 
“  his  head  amongst  the  strumpet  flatteries  of  prelates, 
“  while  he  sleeps  and  thinks  no  harm,  they  wickedly 
“  shaving  off  all  those  bright  and  weighty  tresses  of 
“  his  laws  and  just  prerogatives,  which  were  his  orna- 
“  ment  and  his  strength,  deliver  him  over  to  indirect 
“  and  violent  councils,  which,  as  those  Philistines,  put 
“  out  the  fair  and  far-sighted  eyes  of  his  natural  mind, 
u  and  make  him  grind  in  the  prison-house  of  their 
“  sinister  ends,  and  practise  upon  him ;  till  he,  know- 
“  ing  this  prelatical  razor  to  have  bereft  him  of  his 
“  wonted  might,  nourish  again  his  puissant  hair,  the 
“  golden  beams  of  law  and  right,  and  they,  sternly 
“  shook,  thunder  with  ruin  upon  the  heads  of  those 
“  his  evil  counsellors,  but  not  without  great  affliction 
“  to  himself.” 2 

The  richness  of  the  story  becomes  still  more  evi- 

1  “  Speech  for  the  Liberty  of  un-  2  “  Reasons  of  Church  Govern- 
iicensed  Printing,”  i.  324.  ment,”  i.  149. 


412 


SAMSON. 


Lect.  XVI. 


dent  when  we  see  the  austere 
The  Milton  derived  from  it  in 

Samson 

Agonistes  blindness  and  poverty  and 
dignant  sense  of  public  and  private 


consolation  which 
the  sufferings  of 
age,  and  the  in¬ 
wrong  :  — 


“  O  loss  of  sight,  of  thee  I  most  complain  ! 

Blind  among  enemies,  O  worse  than  chains, 

.  .  .  I,  dark  in  light,  exposed 

To  daily  fraud,  contempt,  abuse,  and  wrong. 


O  dark,  dark,  dark,  amid  the  blaze  of  noon, 
Irrecoverably  dark,  total  eclipse, 

Without  all  hope  of  day !  ” 


“  God  of  our  fathers  !  what  is  man, 

That  thou  towards  him  with  hand  so  various; 

Or  might  I  say,  contrarious, 

Temper’st  thy  Providence  through  his  short  course, 

Not  evenly,  as  thou  rul’st 

The  angelic  orders  and  inferior  creatures  mute, 

Irrational  and  brute ; 

Nor  do  I  name  of  men  the  common  rout, 

That  wandering  loose  about 

Grow  up  and  perish,  as  the  summer  fly, 

Heads  without  name,  no  more  remembered ; 

But  such  as  thou  hast  solemnly  elected, 

With  gifts  and  graces  eminently  adorned, 

To  some  great  work,  thy  glory, 

And  people’s  safety,  which  in  part  they  effect : 

Yet  toward  those  thus  dignified,  thou  oft, 

Amidst  their  height  of  noon, 

Changest  thy  countenance,  and  thy  hand  .  .  . 

Nor  only  dost  degrade  them,  or  remit 
To  life  obscured,  which  were  a  fair  dismission, 

But  throw’st  them  lower  than  thou  didst  exalt  them  high.” 

O 


And  we  may  well  end  this  troubled  period  with 
that  grand  conclusion,  with  which,  after 

.  .  .  “  Samson  hath  quit  himself 

Like  Samson,  and  heroically  hath  finished 
A  life  heroic,” 


Lect.  XVI. 


MILTON’S  USE  OF  THE  STORY. 


418 


the  Chorus  consoles  his  sorrowing  kindred: — 

“  All  is  best,  though  we  oft  doubt, 

What  the  Unsearchable  dispose 
Of  Highest  Wisdom  brings  about, 

And  ever  best  found  in  the  close. 

Oft  He  seems  to  hide  His  face, 

But  unexpectedly  returns, 

And  to  His  faithful  champion  hath  in  place 
Bore  witness  gloriously ;  whence  Gaza  mourns, 
And  all  that  band  them  to  resist 
His  uncontrollable  intent ; 

His  servants  He,  with  new  acquist 

Of  true  experience  from  this  great  event, 

With  peace  and  consolation  hath  dismissed, 

And  calm  of  mind  all  passion  spent.” 


414 


THE  FALL  OF  SHILOH. 


Lect.  XVII. 


LECTURE  XVII 

THE  FALL  OF  SHILOH. 

To  the  crash  of  the  Philistine  Temple,  and  the 
silent  burial  of  Samson,  succeeds  a  blank  in  the 
sacred  history,  such  as  well  serves  to  indicate  its 
fragmentary  character.  When  we  again  take  up  the 
thread,  the  existing  condition  of  the  nation  gives  us 
a  backward  glimpse  into  some  of  the  unrecorded  in¬ 
cidents  of  the  lost  interval.1 

We  find  at  the  head  of  the  nation  a  man,  of  whose 
rise  nothing  has  been  told :  Eli,  at  once  Judge  and 
High  Priest,  already  far  advanced  in  years.  This 
sudden  apparition  reveals,  that,  in  the  dark  period 
The  change  preceding,  there  has  been  a  change  in  the 
Priesthood.  order  of  the  Priesthood.  Eli  is  not  of  the 
regular  house  of  Eleazar,2  the  eldest  son  of  Aaron,  in 
which  the  succession  ought  to  have  continued.  There 
has  been  a  transfer  to  the  house  of  the  younger  and 
comparatively  obscure  Ithamar,  which  had  struck  such 
deep  root,  that  it  continued,  in  spite  of  the  agitations 
of  the  period,  till  its  final  overthrow  in  the  reign  of 
Solomon.  The  transfer  had  been  made  since  the  ap¬ 
pearance  of  Phinehas,  who  is  the  last  legitimate  High 


1  I  have  forborne  to  enlarge  on  the  Ewald  (Ii.  475)  with  Jael  of  Judg.  v. 
history  of  the  obscurer  Judges,  Tola,  6,  and  with  Jair,  of  Eastern  Manasseh. 
Jair  (Judg.  x.  1-5),  Elon,  Abdon  Bedan  has  been  variously  connected 
(Ibid.  xii.  11-15),  Bedan  (1  Sam.  with  Barak,  Abdon,  and  Samson, 
xii.  11).  Jair  has  been  identified  by  2  1  Cbron.  vi.  4-15;  xxiv.  4. 


Lect.  XVII. 


UNION  OF  JUDGE  AND  PRIEST. 


415 


Priest  we  can  trace.  The  Rabbinical  commentators 
allege  that  the  change  took  place  because  of  the 
share  of  Phinehas  in  the  sacrifice  of  Jephthah’s 
daughter.  Can  this  be  possibly  some  faint  reminis¬ 
cence  of  a  tradition  indicating  the  submersion  of  the 
house  of  Eleazar  in  the  general  disorder  of  the  age, 
of  which  that  dark  event  was  undoubtedly  a  conse¬ 
quence  ?  It  appears,  further,  that  the  Philistines  had 
been  repulsed  from  the  position  which  they  had 
occupied  in  the  time  of  Samson.1  Was  this  effected 
through  some  heroic  deed  of  Eli’s  youth?  And  did 
this  raise  him  to  the  office  of  High  Priest  or  of 
J udge  ?  Such  a  supposition  is  rendered  probable  by 
the  union  of  Warrior  and  Priest  in  Phinehas  ;  and  a 
like  transference  of  the  Pontificate  from  a  like  cause 
appears  in  the  only  other  time  of  the  history  when 
it  reaches  to  a  like  eminence,  —  when  the  Priestly 
house  of  the  Maccabees  became  also  the  rulers  of . 
their  countrymen. 

In  the  union  of  Judge  and  Priest  in  Eli  we  have 
a  gradual  approximation  to  the  consolidation  union  of 
of  power  in  the  monarchy.  It  was  the  only  Priest, 
part  of  what  is  commonly  called  “the  theocratic 
period,”  in  which  the  government  was  theocratic  in 
the  modern  sense  of  the  word  —  that  of  Priestly 
government,  of  ecclesiastical  supremacy  and  indepen¬ 
dence,  such  as  has  been  occasionally  advocated  by  the 
Christian  Church.  But  this  very  peculiarity  is  not 
the  culmination  of  the  Mosaic  period,  so  much  as  a 
temporary  transition  to  the  next  stage  of  the  second 
history,  when  the  powers  of  Priest  and  Ruler  were 
indeed  united,  not  however  in  the  person  of  the 
High  Priests,  but  of  the  Kings  and  Princes  of  Judah.2 

1  1  Sam.  iv.  1.  2  Kings  vi.  14,  17,  18;  2  Sam.  xx. 

2  See  (in  Hebrew  and  LXX.)  26;  viii.  17,  18;  Ps.  cx.  1-11. 


416 


THE  FALL  OF  SHILOH. 


Lect.  XYII. 


The  reign  of  Eli,  therefore,  combines  in  a  remark¬ 
able  manner  the  fall  of  the  old  and  the  rise  of  the 
new  order. 

Of  all  the  portions  of  the  sacred  history  this  is  the 
one  which  most  clearly  sets  before  us,  in  the  light 
which  precedes  its  final  overthrow,  the  sanctuary  of 
Shiloh.  Shiloh.  The  ancient  tent  of  Shiloh  —  me¬ 
morial  of  the  old  nomadic  state,  containing  the  Ark, 
the  relic  of  Mount  Sinai  —  has  been  already  de¬ 
scribed.  Tombs,  which  still  remain  in  a  rocky  val¬ 
ley  near  the  site  of  the  ancient  town,  had  been 
hewn  in  the  steep  sides  of  the  hill.  A  city  (as  in 
the  case  of  Micah’s  rival  sanctuary,  but  here  doubt¬ 
less  on  a  larger  scale),  had  sprung  up  round  it.1  The 
sanctuary  itself  was  so  encased  with  buildings,  as  to 
give  it  the  name  and  appearance  of  a  a  house  ”  or 
“  temple.” 2  As  in  Micah’s  sanctuary,  there  was  a 
gateway,3  with  a  seat  inside  the  doorposts  or  pillars 
which  supported  it.4  It  was  the  “  seat,”  or  “  throne,” 
of  the  ruler  or  judge  (as  afterwards  in  the  Palace  of 
Solomon).  Here  Eli  sat  on  days  of  religious  or  po¬ 
litical  solemnity,  and  surveyed  the  worshippers  as  they 
came  up  the  eminence  on  which  the  sanctuary  was 
placed. 

To  this  consecrated  spot  pilgrims  and  worshippers 
The  wor-  were  attracted,  as  to  the  religious  centre  of 
shippers,  their  country,  at  the  yearly  feast,  the  chief 
feast  of  the  year  —  that  of  “  The  Bowers,”  or  “  Tab¬ 
ernacles,”  which  coexisted  with  the  Festival  of  the 
vintage.  The  sides  of  the  valley  in  which  Shiloh  lay 

1  1  Sam.  iv.  13.  on  the  supposition  that  the  words 

2  Ibid.  i.  9  ;  iii.  3.  are  used  with  intentional  exactness. 

3  Judg.  xviii.  16,  17.  The  word  They  may,  however,  have  been  (like 

used  in  1  Sam.  i.  9,  for  “  post,”  is  the  the  phrase  in  1  Sam.  iv.  4)  transferred 

same  as  that  in  Ex.  xii.  7  ;  xxi.  6  ;  from  the  later  Temple. 

Deut.  vi.  9,  for  “door-post.”  This  is  4  1  Sam.  i.  9  ;  iv.  13,  18. 


Lect.  XVII. 


THE  WORSHIPPERS  OF  SHILOH. 


417 


were  clothed  with  vineyards,  and  in  these  vineyards 
the  maidens  of  Shiloh  came  out  to  dance,  and  the 
whole  population,  of  pilgrims  and  of  the  inhabitants, 
men  and  women  alike,  gave  themselves  up  to  the 
usual  merriment  of  eating  and  drinking.1 

In  this  miscellaneous  assemblage,  were  to  be  seen 
worshippers  of  the  most  various  characters.  One 
group  of  frequent  occurrence,  year  by  year,  was  that 
of  Elkanah,  from  the  neighboring  hills  of  Eikanah. 
Ephraim,  with  his  numerous  family.  He  is  a  rare 
instance  of  polygamy  amongst  the  common  ranks  of 
the  nation.  It  may  have  been  one  of  the  results  of 
the  disordered  state  of  the  times.  It  may  have 
arisen  (as  still  in  the  Samaritan  sect)  from  the 
barrenness  of  one  of  his  two  wives.  His  sacri¬ 
fice  on  these  occasions  was  looked  forward  to  in 
his  house  as  a  grand  feast  in  which  every  mem¬ 
ber  of  the  family  had  a  portion  of  the  sacrificial 
offerings. 

But  it  is  on  one  individual  of  the  house  that  our 
attention  is  specially  fixed:  his  best  beloved  Hannah, 
but  childless  wife,  who  bears  the  Phoenician  name2 
which  now  first  appears,  “ Hannah,”  or  “Anna;”  af¬ 
terwards  thrice 3  consecrated  in  the  sacred  story. 
She  was  herself  almost  a  prophetess  and  Nazarite.4 
She  is  the  first  instance  of  silent  prayer.  Her  song 
of  thanksgiving  is  the  first  hymn,  properly  so  called, 
—  the  direct  model  of  the  first  Christian  hymn  of 
“  the  Magnificat,”  the  first  outpouring  of  individual  as 
distinct  from  national  devotion,  the  first  indication  of 

1  Judg.  xxi.  19-21;  1  Sam.  i.  9,  i.  9.)  Anna,  the  daughter  of  Phanuel 

13,  14.  (Luke  ii.  36)  ;  Anna,  the  wife  of  Jo- 

2  l  “  Anna,”  the  mother  of  Dido.  achirn,  the  traditional  mother  of  the 

3  Anna,  the  wife  of  Tobit ;  (Tobit  Virgin. 

4  1  Sam.  i.  15 ;  ii.  1. 


53 


418 


THE  FALL  OF  SHILOH. 


Lect.  XVII. 


the  coming  greatness  of  the  anointed  king,1  whether 
in  the  divine  or  human  sense. 

To  this  group  is  at  last  added  the  child,  who 
Samuel.  though  of  no  Priestly  tribe,  was  consecrated 
to  a  more  than  Priestly  office,2  with  the  offerings  of 
three  bullocks,  flour,  and  a  skin  of  wine,  and  who 
from  his  earliest  years  ministered  in  the  sacred  vest¬ 
ments  within  the  Tabernacle  itself,  the  future  inau- 
gurator  of  the  new  period  of  the  Church. 

Other  pilgrims  were  there  of  a  far  other  kind ; 
and  the  eyes  of  others  than  the  aged  Eli  were  fixed 
Hophni  upon  them.  Hophni  and  Phinehas,  his  two 
nehas.  sons,  are  for  students  of  ecclesiastical  history, 
characters  66  of  great  and  instructive  wickedness.” 
They  are  the  true  exemplars  of  the  grasping  and 
worldly  clergy  of  all  ages.  It  was  the  sacrificial 
feasts  that  gave  occasion  for  their  rapacity.  It  was 
the  dances  and  assemblies  of  the  women  in  the  vine¬ 
yards,  and  before  the  sacred  tent,3  that  gave  occasion 
for  their  debaucheries.  They  were  the  worst  devel¬ 
opment  of  the  lawlessness  of  the  age;  penetrating, 
as  in  the  case  of  the  wandering  Levite  of  the  book 
of  Judges,  into  the  most  sacred  offices.  But  the 
coarseness  of  their  vices  does  not  make  the  moral  less 
pointed  for  all  times.  The  three-pronged  fork  which 
fishes  up  the  seething  flesh  is  the  earliest  type  of 
grasping  at  pluralities  and  church-preferments  by  base 
means ;  the  open  profligacy  at  the  door  of  the  Tab¬ 
ernacle  is  the  type  of  many  a  scandal  brought  on 
the  Christian  Church  by  the  selfishness  or  sensuality 
of  its  ministers.  An  additional  touch  of  nature  is 
given  by  the  close  connection  of  these  Priestly  vices 

1  1  Sam.  ii.  10.  The  first  mention  2  2  Chron.  xiii.  9  ;  1  Sam.  i.  24. 
of  the  Messiah.  3  Judg.  xxi.  21  ;  1  Sam.  ii.  22. 


Lect.  XVII.  THE  DOOM  OF  THE  HOUSE  OF  ITIIAMAR.  419 


with  the  weak  indulgence  of  Eli,  and  the  blameless 
purity  of  Samuel.  The  judgment  which  falls  on  the 

house  of  Ithamar  is  the  likeness  of  the  judgment 

which  has  followed  the  corruption  and  the  nepotism 
of  the  clergy  everywhere.  It  was  to  begin  with  the 
alienation  of  the  people  from  the  worship  of  the 

sanctuary  —  it  was  to  end  in  a  violent  revolution 
which  should  overthrow  with  bloodshed,  confiscation, 
and  long  humiliation  the  ancient  hereditary  succes¬ 
sion  and  the  whole  existing  hierarchy  of  Israel.1 
"Men  abhorred  the  offerings  of  the  Lord.”  ...  "I 
“  said  indeed  that  thy  house  and  the  house  of  thy 

"  father  should  walk  before  me  forever.  But  now 
"  the  Lord  saith,  ‘  Be  it  far  from  me.’  ‘  All  the  in- 
“ ‘  crease  of  thy  house  shall  die  "  by  the  sword.”  ’ 
“  Every  one  that  is  left  in  thine  house  shall  crouch  to 
“  him  for  a  piece  of  silver,  and  a  morsel  of  bread,  and 
66  shall  say,  Put  me,  I  pray  thee,  into  one  of  the 
"  priests’  offices,  that  I  may  eat  a  piece  of  bread.” 

The  judgment,  of  which  the  earliest  indication 
comes  from  some  unknown  prophet,  is  first  solemnly 
announced  from  an  unexpected  quarter,  and  in  a 
form  which  shows  that  the  thunders  and  lightnings, 
the  oracular  warnings,  of  the  older  period,  are  about 
to  be  superseded  by  "  a  still  small  voice  ”  of  a  wholly 
different  kind. 

It  was  night  in  the  sanctuary.  As  afterwards  in  the 
great  Temple,  so  now,  the  High  Priest  slept  in  The  doom 
one  of  the  adjacent  chambers,  and  the  attend-  Jouseof 
ant  ministers  in  another.  In  the  centre,  on  Ithamar' 
the  left  of  the  entrance,  stood  the  seven-branched 
candlestick,2  now  mentioned  for  the  last  time;  super- 

1  1  Samuel  ii.  17,  29,  30,  33,  36  2  Ex.  xxv.  31 ;  xxxvii.  17, 18;  Lev 

(LXX.).  xxiv.  3  ;  2  Chron.  xiii.  11. 


420 


THE  FALL  OF  SHILOH. 


Lect.  XYII 


seded  in  the  reign  of  Solomon,  by  the  ten  separate 
candlesticks,  but  revived  after  the  Captivity  by  the 
copy  of  the  one  candlestick  with  seven  branches,  as 
it  is  still  seen  on  the  Arch  of  Titus.  It  was  the  only 
light  of  the  Tabernacle  during  the  night,  was  solemnly 
lighted  every  evening,  as  in  the  devotions  of  the 
Eastern  wTorld,  both  Mussulman  and  Christian,  and 
extinguished  just  before  morning,  when  the  doors 
were  opened.1 

In  the  deep  silence  of  that  early  morning,  before 
the  sun  had  risen,  when  the  sacred  light  was  still 
burning,  came,  through  the  mouth  of  the  innocent 
child,  the  doom  of  the  house  of  Ithamar. 

The  first  blow  in  the  impending  tragedy  came 
from  the  now  constant  enemy  of  Israel.  The  Philis¬ 
tines  revived  their  broken  strength.  The  conflict  took 
place  at  a  spot  near  the  western  entrance  of  the 

The  battle  Pass  Beth-horon,  known  by  the  name  of 
of  Aphek.  Aphek,  but  in  later  times  —  from  the  memory 

of  a  victory  which  effaced  the  recollection  of  this  dark 
day,  —  “  Eben-Ezer.” 2  A  reverse  roused  the  alarm  of 
the  Israelite  chiefs.  In  that  age,  as  in  the  Mediaeval 
period  of  the  Christian  Church,  to  which  we  have  so 
often  compared  it,  the  ready  expedient  was  to  turn 
the  sacred  relics  of  religion  into  an  engine  of  war. 
The  Philistines  themselves  were  in  the  habit  of  bring¬ 
ing  the  images  of  their  gods  to  the  field  of  battle.3 
To  these  must  be  opposed  the  symbol  of  the  Divine 
Presence  in  Israel,  the  Ark  of  the  Covenant.  Such 
an  application  of  the  Ark  was  not  without  example 
before  or  after ;  but  it  is  evidently  described  as  against 
the  higher  spirit  of  the  religion  which  it  was  intended 


A 


1  1  Sam.  iii.  15 ;  1  Chron.  ix.  27. 
*2  See  Lecture  XVIII. 


3  2  Sam.  v.  21. 


Lect.  XVII. 


THE  DEATH  OF  ELI. 


421 


to  support.  Hophni  and  Phinehas  were  with  it  as 
representatives  of  the  Priestly  order.  To  the  profli¬ 
gate  vices  of  their  youth  they  joined  the  sin  of  super¬ 
stition  also.  Their  appearance  with  the  Ark  roused 
as  with  a  spasmodic  effort  the  sinking  spirit  of  the 
army.  The  well-known  cheer  of  the  Israelites  —  terri¬ 
ble  to  their  enemies  at  all  times  —  ran  through  the 
camp  so  that  “  the  earth  rang  again/’ 1  and  the  Phi¬ 
listines  were  roused  to  the  last  pitch  of  desperate 
courage  in  resisting,  as  they  thought,  this  new  and 
Divine  enemy. 

On  that  day  the  fate  of  the  house  of  EH  was  to  he 
determined.  It  was  the  crisis  of  the  nation.  It  was, 
as  the  Philistines  expressed  it,  to  decide  whether  the 
Philistines  were  to  be  the  slaves  of  the  Hebrews,  or 
the  Hebrews  of  the  Philistines.  On  the  success  of 
this  wager  of  battle,  the  Priestly  rulers  of  the  nation 
had  staked  the  most  sacred  pledge  of  their  religion. 
The  whole  city  and  sanctuary  of  Shiloh  waited  for 
the  result  in  breathless  expectation.  Two  above  all 
others,  Eli  and  the  wife  of  Phinehas,  were  wrapt  in 
dreadful  expectation,  —  he  blind  and  feeble  with  age, 
—  she  near  to  the  delivery  of  her  second  child.  In 
the  evening  of  the  same  day  there  rushed  The  tid- 

i  *ii  ip  i  *n"s 

through  the  vale  of  Shiloh  a  youth  from  the  defeat, 
camp,  one  of  the  active  tribe  of  Benjamin,  —  his 
clothes  torn  asunder,  and  his  hair  sprinkled  with  dust, 
as  the  two  Oriental  signs  of  grief  and  dismay.2  A 
loud  wail,  like  that  which  on  the  announcement  of 
any  great  calamity,  runs  through  all  Eastern  towns, 
rang  through  the  streets  of  the  expectant  city.  The 
aged  High  Priest  was  sitting  in  his  usual  place  be¬ 
side  the  gate-way  of  the  sanctuary.  He  caught  the 
1  1  Sam.  iv.  5.  2  Ibid.  iv.  12. 


422 


THE  FALL  OF  SHILOH. 


Lect.  XVII 


cry ;  he  asked  the  tidings.  He  heard  the  defeat  of 
the  army ;  he  heard  the  death  of  his  two  sons ;  he 
heard  the  capture  of  the  Ark  of  God.  It  was  this 
The  death  last  tidings,  “  when  mention  was  made  of  the 
of  Eh.  Ark  0f  that  broke  the  old  man’s  heart. 

He  fell  from  his  seat  and  died  in  the  fall. 

The  news  spread  and  reached  the  home  of  Phine- 

The  birth  has.  The  pangs  of  labor  overtook  the  widow 
of  ichabod.  fapen  Priest.  Not  even  the  birth  of  a 

living  son  could  rouse  her.  “  Their  Priests/’ 1  as  the 
Psalmist  long  afterwards  expressed  it,  “  had  fallen,  and 
their  widows  made  no  lamentation.”  With  her  as  with 
her  father-in-law,  her  whole,  soul  was  absorbed  in  one 
thought,  and  with  her  last  breath  she  gave  to  the 
child  a  name  which  should  be  a  memorial  of  that 
awful  hour,  —  “  I-chabod,”  “  The  glory  is  departed  ;  for 
“  the  Ark  of  God  is  taken.” 

“  The  Ark  of  God  was  taken.”  These  words  ex- 
The  cap-  pressed  the  whole  significance  of  the  calamity. 

tivity  of  . 

the  Ark.  It  was  known,  till  the  era  oi  the  next  great, 
and  still  greater  overthrow  of  the  nation,  at  the 
Babylonian  exile,  as  “  the  Captivity.”  “  The  day  of 
the  captivity  ”  was  the  epoch  which  closed  the  irregu¬ 
lar  worship  of  the  sanctuary  at  Han.2  “He  delivered 
his  strength  into  captivity ,  and  his  glory,”3  (that  “  glory” 
of  the  Divine  Presence,  which  was  commemorated  in 
the  name  of  I-chabod)  “into  the  enemy’s  hand.”  The 
Septuagint  title  of  the  96th  Psalm,  “when  the  house 
of  God  was  built  after  the  captivity ;  ”  and  the  allusion 
in  the  68th  Psalm,  “Thou  hast  led  captivity  captive,”4 
most  probably  refer  to  the  period  of  these  disasters. 

1  1  Sam.  iv.  19,  20;  Ps.  lxxviii.  3  Ps.  lxxviii.  61.  The  word,  how- 

64.  ever,  is  different. 

2  Judg.  xviii.  30.  4  ps.  Lxviii.  18. 


Lect.  XVII. 


THE  RETURN  OF  THE  ARK. 


423 


The  grief  of  Israel  may  be  measured  by  the  tri¬ 
umph,  not  unmingled  with  awe,  of  the  Philistines.  It 
was  to  them  as  if  they  had  captured  Jehovah  Him¬ 
self;  and  a  custom  long  continued  in  the  sanctuary 
of  Dagon  in  their  chief  city  of  Ashdod,  to  commemo¬ 
rate  the  tradition  of  the  terror  which  this  new  Pres¬ 
ence  had  excited.  The  priests  and  the  worshippers 
of  Dagon  would  never  step  on  the  threshold,1  where 
the  human  face  and  human  hands  of  the  Fish  God  had 
been  found  broken  off  from  the  body  of  the  statue  as 
it  lay  prostrate  before  the  superior  Deity. 

The  elaborate  description,  too,  of  the  joy  of  the  re¬ 
turn  marks  the  deep  sense  of  the  loss.  In  The  Re- 

...  turn  of  the 

the  border  land  of  the  two  territories,  m  the  Ark. 
vast  corn-fields,2  under  the  hills  of  Dan,  the  villagers 
of  Beth-shemesh  at  their  harvest,  see  the  procession 
winding  through  the  plain,  the  Philistine  princes  mov¬ 
ing  behind,  the  cart  conveying  the  sacred  relic,  drawn 
by  the  two  cows,  lowing  as  they  advance  towards  the 
group  of  expectant  Israelites,  who  “  lifted  up  their  eyes 
and  saw  the  ark,  and  rejoiced  to  see  it.”  The  great 
stone 3  on  which  the  cart  and  the  cows  were  sacrificed, 
was  long  pointed  out  as  a  monument  of  the  event. 
But  even  the  restoration  of  the  Ark  was  clouded  with 
calamities ;  and  when  from  Beth-shemesh  it  mounted 
upwards  through  the  hills  to  Kirjath-jearim,  and  was 
lodged  there  in  a  little  sanctuary,  with  a  self-conse¬ 
crated  Priest  of  its  own,  there  was  still  a  longing 
sense  of  vacancy ;  whilst  it  remained  “  in  the  fields 
“  of  the  wood,” 4  there  was  66  no  sleep  to  the  eyes  or 
“  slumber  to  the  eyelids  ”  of  the  devout  Israelite.  66  It 

1  1  Sam.  v.  5.  According  to  the  of  Beth-shemesh,  see  Kennicott’s  Ob- 

LXX.  “  they  leaped  over  it.”  servations  on  1  Sam.  vi.  19.  He  re- 

2  Robinson,  B.  R.  ii.  225-9.  duces  them  from  50,070  to  70. 

3  1  Sam.  vi.  18.  For  the  numbers  4  Ps.  cxxxii.  5, 6,  (jear im  =■  woods). 


424 


THE  FALL  OF  SHILOH. 


Lect.  XVII 


u  came  to  pass  while  the  ark  was  at  Kirjath-jearim, 
“  that  the  time  was  long ;  for  it  was  twenty  years ; 
“  and  all  the  house  of  Israel  lamented  after  the 
“  Lord.”  1 

It  was  the  first  pledge  of  returning  hope ;  but  the 
hope  was  still  long  deferred ;  and  meanwhile  the 
catastrophe  was  branded  into  the  national  mind  by 

Overthrow  overthrow  of  the  sanctuary  itself  of  Shi- 

0f  sinioh.  *n  wpL{c]1  the  Ark  had  since  the  conquest 

found  its  chief  home.  We  catch  a  distant  glimpse  of 
massacre  with  fire  and  sword ;  of  a  city  sacked  and 
plundered  by  ruthless  invaders.  “  He  gave  his  people 
“  over  to  the  sword ;  and  was  wroth  with  his  inheri- 
“  tance.  The  fire  consumed  their  young  men,  their 
“  maidens  were  not  given  to  marriage  ” 2  The  details 
of  the  overthrow  are  not  given ;  partly  perhaps  be¬ 
cause  the  sanctuary  gradually  decayed  when  the  glory 
of  the  Ark  was  departed ;  partly  from  the  imperfect 
state  of  the  narrative,  which  may  itself  have  been 
caused  by  the  silent  horror  of  the  event.  Shiloh  is 
casually  mentioned  twice  or  thrice3  in  the  later  his¬ 
tory.  But  the  reverence  had  ceased.  The  Tabernacle, 
under  which  the  Ark  had  rested,  was  carried  off,  first 
to  Nob,  and  then  to  Gibeon,  with  the  original  brazen 
altar4  of  the  wilderness.  The  place  became  desolate, 
and  has  remained  so  ever  since.  “  Thou  shalt  see 
“  thine  enemy  in  my  habitation  ”  The  name  became 
a  proverb  for  destruction  and  desolation.  “  I  will  do 
“  to  this  house  as  I  have  done  to  Shiloh.”  “  Go  now 

1  1  Sam.  vii.  2.  3  Ahijah  the  Shilonite  (1  Kings  xi. 

2  Ps.  lxxviii.  62,  63.  May  not  this  29).  Pilgrims  “from  Shiloh”  (Jer. 

be  taken  literally  of  the  Philistines  xli.  5).  Possibly  “  Ahijah  .  .  .  priest 
burning  their  Israelite  prisoners  alive?  in  Shiloh”  (1  Sam.  xiv.  3,  LXX.). 

That  this  was  a  Philistine  custom  ap-  4  1  Sam.  xxi.  1 ;  1  Sam.  vii.  1 ;  2 
pears  from  Judg.  xv.  6.  Chron.  i.  5;  v.  5. 


Lect.  XVII.  OVERTHROW  OF  THE  SANCTUARY. 


425 


"  unto  my  place  which  was  at  Shiloh ;  .  .  .  and  see 
"what  I  did  to  it  for  the  wickedness  of  my  people 
"Israel”  "I  will  make  this  house  like  Shiloh  ...  a 
"  curse  to  all  the  nations  of  the  earth.” 1  The  very 
locality  became  so  little  known  that  it  had  to  be  speci¬ 
fied  carefully  in  the  following  centuries  in  order  to  be 
recognized.  "  Shiloh,  which  is  in  the  land  of  Canaan? 
"  which  is  on  the  north  side  of  Bethel ,  on  the  east  side 
"  of  the  highivay  that  goeth  up  from  Beth-el  to  Shechem, 
"  and  on  the  south  of  Lebonah.” 2  It  is  only  this  exact 
description,  thus  required  by  the  very  extremity  of 
its  destruction,  which  enabled  a  traveller  from  Amer¬ 
ica,3  within  our  own  memory,  to  rediscover  its  site,  to 
which  the  sacred  name  still  clung  with  a  touching 
tenacity  forgotten  for  centuries,  and  known  only  to 
the  savage  peasants  who  prowl  about  its  few  broken 
ruins. 

So  ended  the  period,  defined  as  that  during  which 
"  the  house  of  God  was  in  Shiloh.” 4  So  ended  the 
period  of  the  supremacy  of  the  tribe  of  Ephraim,  whose 
fall  is  described,  in  the  Psalm  which  unfolds  their  for¬ 
tunes,  as  involved- in  the  fall  of  Shiloh  —  "He  forsook 
"  the  tabernacle  of  Shiloh,  the  tent  that  He  had  pitched 
"  among  men.  He  refused  the  tabernacle  of  Joseph, 
"  and  chose  not  the  tribe  of  Ephraim  ” 5  So  ended 
the  still  wider  period  of  the  first  division  of  the  his¬ 
tory  of  the  Chosen  People,  in  the  overthrow  of  the 
first  sanctuary  by  the  Philistines,  as  the  second  divis¬ 
ion  and  overthrow  was  to  terminate  in  the  fall  of 
the  second  sanctuary,  the  Temple  of  the  Jewish  mon- 
,rchy,  by  the  armies  of  Babylon ;  and  the  third  in 

1  Jer.  vii.  12,  14  ;  xxvi.  6.  3  Seilun  was  first  rediscovered  by 

2  Judg.  xxi.  12, 19.  See  Ewald,  ii.  Dr.  Robinson  in  1838. 

423.  4  Judg.  xviii.  31. 

5  Ps.  lxxviii.  60,  67. 


54 


426 


THE  EALL  OF  SHILOH. 


Lect.  XYII 


the  still  vaster  destruction  of  the  last  Temple  of  Jeru¬ 
salem  by  the  armies  of  Titus.  The  revival  of  the 
nation  from  the  ruins  of  the  first  sanctuary  must  be 
reserved  for  the  rise  of  the  Second  Period  of  the 
Jewish  Church,  when  “  the  Lord  was  to  awake  as  one 
“out  of  sleep1  .  .  .  and  choose  the  tribe  of  Judah, 
“the  Mount  Zion  which  He  loved.”  Only  we  may 
still  include  within  this  epoch  the  great  name  of  Sam¬ 
uel,  and  the  great  office  of  Prophet,  which  was  to 
unite  the  old  and  the  new  together,  under  the  shelter 
of  which  was  to  spring  up  the  new  institutions  of  the 
monarchy  —  a  new  tribe,  a  new  capital,  a  new  Church, 
with  new  forms  of  communion  with  the  Almighty, 
now  for  the  first  time  named  by  the  name  of  “  the 
“Lord  of  Hosts.” 


1  Ps.  lxxviii.  65,  68. 


SAMUEL  AND  THE  PROPHETICAL  OFFICE. 


XYIII.  SAMUEL. 


XIX.  THE  HISTORY  OF  THE  PROPHETICAL  ORDER. 

XX.  THE  NATURE  OF  THE  PROPHETICAL  TEACHING. 


SPECIAL  AUTHORITIES  FOR  THE  LIFE  OF  SAMUEL 


1.  1  Sam.  i-xxviii.  (Hebrew  and  LXX.)  ;  1  Chron.  xxix.  29  ;  Ps. 

xcix.  6 ;  Jer.  xv.  1 ;  Ecclus.  xlvi.  13-20 ;  Acts  iii.  24,  xiii.  20 ; 
Heb.  xi.  32. 

2.  Jewish  traditions  (Jos.  Ant.  v.  10-vi.  14) ;  Fabricius,  Cod.  Pseude- 

pigr.  Vet.  Test.  895-903. 

3.  Mussulman  traditions  (D’Herbelot,  under  Aschmouyl )  ;  and  Weil’s 

Biblical  Legends ,  144-151. 

4.  Christian  traditions  ( Acta  Sanctorum ,  Aug.  20). 


SAMUEL  AND  THE  PROPHETICAL  OFFICE. 


LECTURE  XVIII. 

SAMUEL. 

The  fall  of  the  sanctuary  of  Shiloh  was  the  ter¬ 
mination  of  the  first  period  of  Jewish  history  close 
which  had  lasted  from  Moses  to  Eli.  It  had  Theocracy, 
been  a  period  varied  and  shifting  in  detail,  but  with 
this  common  feature,  —  that  it  was  a  time  of  wan¬ 
dering  and  of  strife,  of  danger  and  of  deliverance, 
of  continual  and  direct  dependence  on  the  help  of 
God  alone,  with  no  regular  means  of  government,  or 
law,  or  army,  or  king,  to  ward  off  the  enemies  that 
were  constantly  assailing  them  from  without,  or  to 
repress  the  disorders  that  were  constantly  disturbing 
them  from  within.  The  Judges  themselves  were 
regarded  as  invested  with  something  of  a  divine  or 
God-like  character;  the  more  so  perhaps  from  their 
solitary  and  strange  elevation  above  all  around  them. 
A  new  selection  of  Judges  is  described  as  “  a  choosing 
of  new  Gods;”1  and  the  two  last  of  the  series  are 
especially  dignified  with  the  name  of  “  God.” 2  This 
period,  called  on  these  accounts  by  Josephus  u  the 

1  Judg.  v.  8.  him.  Samuel, in  1  Sam. xxviii.  13,  “I 

2  Eli,  in  1  Sam.  ii.  25  —  The  Judge  “  saw  gods  ( Eloihim ).”  Compare  Ps. 
(Heb.  “  the  God,”  Elohim)  shall  judge  lxxxii.  1,  2,  6. 


430 


SAMUEL. 


Lect.  XVIII. 


Theocracy”  or  “ Aristocracy,” 1  was  now  at  an  end. 
The  wanderings  were  at  last  over,  and  the  battle  was 
at  last  won.  The  desire  of  the  people  was  stimulated 
by  its  nearer  insight  into  the  customs  of  the  sur¬ 
rounding  nations  to  have  a  ruler  like  to  them ;  the 
coming  change  had  already,  as  we  saw  in  the  times 
Beginning  of  the  Judges,  made  itself  felt  by  the  gradual 
archy.  approximation  to  such  an  institution  m  the 
lives  of  Jair  and  Abdon,  Gideon  and  Abimelech,  Eli 
and  Samuel.  All  these  indications  were  at  last  to  re¬ 
ceive  their  full  accomplishment  in  the  inauguration  of 
a  fixed,  hereditary,  regal  government,  in  the  person 
of  the  first  king  —  "Behold  the  king  whom  ye  have 
"  chosen,  and  whom  ye  have  desired.  Behold,  the 
“  Lord  hath  set  a  king  over  you.”  Now,  therefore, 
was  to  begin  that  second  period,  that  new  and  untried 
future,  which  was  to  last  for  another  five  hundred 
years  —  the  period  of  the  Monarchy.  Was  it  possible 
that  an  institution  which  had  begun  in  wilfulness  and 
distrust  would  ripen  into  a  just  and  holy  law?  would 
the  establishment  of  armies,  and  officers  of  state,  and 
king  succeeding  king,  as  a  matter  of  course,  without 
any  sudden  call  or  mission,  —  would  the  growth  of 
4  poetry,  and  architecture,  and  music,  and  all  the  other 
arts  which  spring  up  under  an  established  rule, — 
would  the  secure  dwelling  of  every  man  under  his 
own  vine  and  fig-tree,  —  would  these  and  many  like 
changes  destroy  or  confirm,  diminish  or  expand,  the 
faith  which  had  hitherto  been  the  safety  of  the  Chosen 
People  ?  Would  the  true  Theocracy,  the  government 
of  God,  be  weakened  or  strengthened,  now  that  in 
name  it  was  withdrawn  ?  Was  this  great  stride  in 
earthly  civilization  inconsistent  with  the  preservation 

1  Jos.  Ant.  vi.  3,  §§  2,  3. 


Lect.  XVIII. 


EPOCH  OF  HIS  APPEARANCE. 


431 


of  the  ancient  primeval  religion  of  Abraham,  and 
Moses,  and  Joshua  ? 

Such  were  the  questions  which  actually  would  arise 
in  the  mind  of  any  thoughtful  Israelite  at  Transition, 
this  crisis.  They  are  questions  which,  in  some  form 
or  other,  arise  at  every  like  crisis  in  the  progress  of 
the  Church.  It  must  be  reserved  for  the  discussion 
of  the  history  of  the  Monarchy  to  point  out  how 
these  natural  fears  were  in  part  justified,  but  yet  on 
the  whole  rendered  futile,  by  the  actual  results  of 
the  change.  In  the  Kings  of  Israel  and  Judah  we 
shall  see  the  first  exhibition  of  that  union  of  regal 
and  priestly  excellence,  which  was  to  be  completed 
in  a  yet  diviner  sense,  only  in  the  final  stage  of  the 
sacred  history.  We  shall  trace  in  the  victories  of  the 
hosts  of  Israel  the  first  complete  establishment  of  the 
new  and  great  name  of  God,  —  “  The  Lord  of  Hosts,” 
“Jehovah  Sabaoth.”  In  the  Psalms  of  David,  in  the 
Temple  of  Solomon,  and  in  the  Prophecies  of  Isaiah, 
we  shall  recognize  a  fuller  communion  with  God, 
even  than  on  the  holy  mountain  of  Sinai,  or  in  the 
speaking  face  to  face  with  Moses  as  with  a  friend. 

But  those  blessings  were  still  in  the  distance.  We 
are  yet  on  the  threshold.  It  will,  however,  be  useful  * 
here  to  describe  the  influences  first  of  the  indi¬ 
vidual  and  then  of  the  office,  which  were  raised 
up  to  guide  the  Jewish  Church  (and,  by  example, 
the  Christian  Church)  through  this  or  any  like 
transitions. 

In  this  crisis  of  the  Chosen  People,  second  only  in 
importance  to  the  Exodus,  there  appeared  a  leader, 
second  only  to  Moses.  Amidst  the  wreck  of  the  an¬ 
cient  institutions  of  the  country,  amidst  the  rise  and 
growth  of  the  new,  there  was  one  counsellor  to  whom 


432 


SAMUEL. 


Lect.  XVIII. 


all  turned  for  advice  and  support  —  one  heart  to 
Rise  of  which  “  the  Lord  ”  especially  “  revealed  Him- 
Samuei.  self.”  The  life  and  character  of  Samuel,1 
covers  the  whole  of  this  period  of  perplexity  and 
doubt.  The  two  books  which  give  an  account  of  the 
first  establishment  of  the  Monarchy  are  called  by  his 
name,  as  fitly  as  the  books  which  give  an  account 
of  the  establishment  of  the  Theocracy  are  called  by 
the  name  of  Moses.  At  this  close  of  the  first  period 
of  the  Jewish  history,  and  on  the  eve  of  the  second 
period,  it  will  be  necessary  to  draw  forth  those  points 
in  his  character  and  appearance  which  specially  fitted 
him  for  this  position.  As  in  the  case  of  all  the  ear¬ 
lier  characters  of  the  Jewish  Church,  we  must  be 
content  with  an  uncertainty  and  dimness  of  percep¬ 
tion;  we  must  not  expect  to  form  a  complete  por¬ 
traiture  of  either  the  man  or  his  history.  But  the 
general  effect  of  the  whole  career  is  sufficiently  clear, 
and  on  that  alone  I  propose  to  dwell. 

I.  First,  then,  observe  precisely  what  his  position 
was,  and  how  he  filled  it.  He  was  not  a  Founder 
of  a  new  state  of  things  like  Moses,  nor  a  champion 
His  connec-  of  the  existing  order  of  things  like  Elijah  or 
the  past.  Jeremiah.  He  stood,  literally,  between  the 
two  —  between  the  living  and  the  dead,  between  the 
past  and  the  future,  between  the  old  and  the  new, 
with  that  sympathy  for  each  which,  at  such  a  period, 
is  the  best  hope  for  any  permanent  solution  of  the 
questions  which  torment  it.  He  had  been  brought 
up  and  nurtured  in  the  ancient  system.  His  child¬ 
hood  had  been  spent  in  the  Sacred  Tent  of  Shiloh, 

1  This  name  has  been  variously  ex-  Sam.  vii.  9).  Josephus  (Ant.  v.  10,  § 
plained.  The  sacred  narrative  seems  3)  ingeniously  translates  it  by  the 
to  waver  between  “  asked  of  God  ”  (1  well-known  Greek  name  of  “  Theae- 
Sam.  i.  17)  and  “heard  of  God”  (1  tetus.” 


Lect.  XYIII. 


THE  LAST  OF  THE  JUDGES. 


433 


the  last  relic  of  the  Wanderings  in  the  Desert.  His 
early  dedication  to  the  sanctuary  belonged  to  that  age 
of  vows,  of  which  we  saw  the  excess  in  the  rash  and 
hasty  vows  of  Jephthah,  of  Saul,  and  of  the  assembly 
at  Mizpeh ;  in  the  more  regular,  but  still  peculiar  and 
eccentric  devotion  of  Samson  to  the  life  of  a  Nazarite. 
As  he  grew  up,  devoted  by  his  mother,  herself  almost 
a  Nazarite,1  secluded  from  the  world  in  his  linen 
ephod,  his  long  locks  flowing  over  his  shoulders,  on 
which  no  razor  was  ever  to  pass,2  perhaps  we  may 
add,  abstaining  from  all  wine  and  strong  drink,3  he 
must  have  presented  a  likeness,  civilized  and  tamed 
indeed,  but  still  a  likeness,  of  the  wild  Danite  cham¬ 
pion  who  rent  the  lion,  and  smote  the  Philistines  with 
the  jawbone  of  an  ass  —  he  must  have  been  a  living 
memorial  of  past  times,  far  into  a  new  generation 
which  knew  such  things  no  more. 

He  was  also  a  Judge,  of  the  ancient  generation,  the 
last  of  the  Judges,  the  last  of  that  long  succes-  Thelastof 
sion  who  had  been  raised  up  from  Othniel  theJudses- 
downwards  to  effect  special  deliverances.  In  the  over¬ 
throw  of  the  sanctuary  of  Shiloh,  and  the  disasters  which 
followed,  we  hear  not  what  became  of  Samuel.4  He 
next  appears,  after  an  interval  of  many  years,  suddenly 
amongst  the  people,  warning  them  against  their  idol¬ 
atrous  practices.  He  convened  an  assembly  at  Miz¬ 
peh  —  probably  the  place  of  that  name  in  the  tribe  of 
Benjamin  —  and  there  with  a  symbolical  rite,  expressive 
partly  of  deep  humiliation,  partly  of  the  libations  of  a 
treaty,  they  poured  water  on  the  ground,  they  fasted, 

1  See  Lecture  XVII.  swer  to  the  prayers  of  the  nation  on 

2  1  Sam.  i.  11.  the  overthrow  of  the  sanctuary  and 

3  LXX. ;  Ibid.  loss  of  the  ark  (D’Herbelot,  Axvh- 

4  According  to  the  Mussulman  tradi-  mouyl).  This,  though  false  in  the  let- 
tion,  Samuel’s  birth  is  granted  in  an-  ter,  is  true  to  the  spirit  of  Samuel’s  life. 

55 


434 


SAMUEL. 


Lect.  XVIII 


and  tney  entreated  Samuel  to  raise  the  piercing  shrill 
cry,  for  which  his  prayers  were  known,  in  supplication 
to  God  for  them.  It  was  at  the  moment  that  he  was 
offering  up  a  sacrifice,1  and  sustaining  this  loud  cry,  that 
The  battle  the  Philistine  host  burst  suddenly  upon  them.  A 
ezer.  violent  thunderstorm,  and  (according  to  Jose¬ 
phus)2  an  earthquake,  came  to  the  timely  assistance  of 
Israel.  The  Philistines  fled,  and,  exactly  at  the  spot 
where  twenty  years  before  they  had  obtained  their 
great  victory,  they  were  totally  routed.  A  huge  stone 
was  set  up,  which  long  remained  as  a  memorial  of 
Samuel’s  triumph,  and  gave  to  the  place  its  name  of 
Eben-ezer,  “the  Stone  of  Help,”  which  has  thence  passed 
into  Christian  phraseology,  and  become  a  common  name 
of  Puritan  saints  and  Nonconformist  chapels.3  The 
old  Canaanites,  whom  the  Philistines  had  dispossessed 
in  the  outskirts  of  the  Judaean  hills,  seem  to  have 
helped  in  the  battle,  and  “there  was  peace  between 
“  Israel  and  the  Amorites.” 4  A  large  portion  of  lost 
territory  in  the  plain  of  Philistia  was  recovered.  The 
battle  of  Eben-ezer — the  first,  and,  as  far  as  we  know, 
the  only  direct  military  achievement  of  Samuel  — 
marked  as  it  was  by  the  first  return  of  victory  to  the 
arms  of  Israel  after  the  fall  of  Shiloh,  was  apparently 
the  event  which  raised  him  to  the  office  of  “  Judge.” 
There,  in  the  same  way  as  “Jerubbaal,  and  Bedan, 
“and  Jephthah,” 5  with  whom  he  is  thus  classed,  he 
won  his  title  to  that  name,  then  the  highest  in  the 
nation.  He  dwelt  in  his  own  birthplace,  and,  like 
Gideon,  or  like  Micah,  made  it  a  sanctuary  of  his  own. 
There  was  still  no  central  capitol.  Shiloh  was  gone, 

1  Compare  the  situation  of  Pausa-  3  i  Sam.  vii.  12. 

nias  before  the  battle  of  Plataea,  Herod.  4  Ibid.  14;  comp.  Judg.  i.  34,  35. 

ix.  11.  5  Ibid.  xii.  11. 

2  Ant.  vi.  2,  §  2. 


Lect.  XVIII. 


THE  LAST  OF  THE  JUDGES. 


435 


Shechem  was  gone,  and  Jerusalem  was  not  yet  come 
All  was  as  of  old,  yet  uncertain  and  unfixed.  The  per¬ 
sonal,  family  bond  was  stronger  than  the  national.  He 
went  from  year  to  year,  indeed,  in  solemn  circuit  to 
the  ancient  sanctuaries 1  within  his  own  immediate 
neighborhood  —  “  Bethel,  and  Gilgal,  and  Mizpeh  ”  — 
and  “judged  Israel  in  all  those  places.”  But  “his  re- 
“  turn  ”  was  always  to  Ramah ;  “  for  there  was  his 
“  house,  and  there  he  judged  Israel,  and  there  he  built 
“  an  altar  unto  the  Lord.”  As  yet  “  there  was  no  king 
“  in  Israel  —  he  did  what  was  right  in  his  own  eyes  ” 
His  sons,  as  in  the  case  of  those  of  Jair  and  Abdon, 
shared  the  power  with  him,  though  at  the  remote 
southern  sanctuary  of  Beersheba;2  and  in  their  corrupt 
practices  he  lived  to  see  a  repetition  of  the  scandals 
of  Hophni  and  Phinehas.  He  was,  as  it  might  have 
seemed,  but  as  one  of  the  old  chiefs  of  the  bygone 
age  —  half  warrior,  half  sage.  Like  the  Levite  who 
dwelt  in  the  sanctuary  of  Micah,  but  on  a  grander  scale, 
he  was  consulted  throughout  the  neighborhood  His  orac_ 
as  an  oracle  for  any  of  the  vexations  or  difficul-  ularfame- 
ties  of  common  life.3  In  him  we  see  the  last  example 
of  the  custom  which  was  “  beforetime  in  Israel  when 
“  men  went  to  inquire  of  God  ” 4  about  these  matters. 
An  ass  would  have  gone  astray  on  the  mountains,  or 
an  expedition  in  search  of  a  settlement  would  need  to 
be  blessed,  and  the  inquirers  would  come  with  the  ever- 
recurring  present  (bakhshish )  of  the  Oriental  supplicant 
— loaves  of  bread,  or  the  fourth  part  of  a  shekel  of  sil¬ 
ver,5  or  the  offer  of  a  good  place  in  the  new  settlement.6 


1  1  Sam.  vii.  16.  b  ttugl  tolc  jjyiaa- 
4£VG>4  TOVTOIC,  LXX. 

2  Ibid.  viii.  1-4.  This  is  a  re¬ 
markable  instance  of  the  fairness  of 
the  narrative. 


3  1  Sam.  ix.  6. 

4  Ibid.  ix.  9. 

5  Ibid.  ix.  7,  8. 

6  Judg.  xviii.  19. 


436 


SAMUEL. 


Lect.  XVIII 


An  awful  reverence  for  the  ancient  times  thus  grew 
up  around  him.  His  long-protracted  life  was  like  the 
shadow  of  the  great  rock  of  an  older  epoch  projected 
into  the  level  of  a  modern  age.  "  He  judged  Israel 
"  all  his  life :  ”  even  after  the  Monarchy  had  sprung  up, 
he  was  still  a  witness  of  an  earlier  and  more  primitive 
state.  Whatever  murmurs  or  complaints  had  arisen, 
were  always  hushed  for  the  moment  before  his  pres¬ 
ence.  They  leaned  upon  him,  they  looked  back  to  him 
even  from  after-ages,  as  their  fathers  had  leaned  upon 
Moses.  A  peculiar  virtue  was  believed  to  reside  in  his 
intercession.  In  later  times  he  was  conspicuous  amongst 
those  that  " call  upon  the  name  of  the  Lord,”1  and  was 
thus  placed  with  Moses  as  "standing”  (in  the  special 
sense  of  the  attitude  for  prayer 2  "  before  the  Lord.” 
His  prayer  It  was  the  last  consolation  that  he  left  in  his 

of  interces¬ 
sion.  parting  address,  that  he  would  “pray  to  the 

"  Lord  ” 3  for  the  people.  With  the  wild  scream  or  shriek 
of  supplication  which  has  been  already  noticed  on  the 
eve  of  his  first  battle,  he  would  "  cry”  in  agitated 
moments,  "all  night  long  unto  the  Lord,”  and  thus 
seem  to  draw  down,  as  if  by  force,  the  Divine  answer. 
"  Cease  not  to  cry  to  the  Lord  for  us.”  "  And  Samuel 
cried  unto  the  Lord  .  .  .  and”  (as  if  with  a  special  ref¬ 
erence  to  the  meaning  of  his  name,  "asked”  or  "heard” 
of  God)  "the  Lord  heard  him.”4  No  festive  or  solemn 
occasion  was  complete  without  his  presence.  "  The 
"  people  will  not  eat  until  he  come,  because  he  doth 
"  bless  the  sacrifice ;  and  afterwards  they  eat  that  be 
"  bidden.” 5  His  coming  was  a  signal  for  mingled  fear 
and  joy.  The  elders  of  Bethlehem  "trembled  at  his 


1  Ps.  xcix.  6  ;  comp.  2  Sam.  xii.  16. 

2  Jer.  xv.  1. 

3  1  Sam.  xii.  17,  23. 


4  1  Sam.  xv.  11 ;  vii.  8,  9. 

5  Ibid.  ix.  1 3. 


Lect.  XVIII. 


THE  FIRST  OF  THE  PROPHETS. 


437 


“ coming,  and  said,  ‘Comest  thou  peaceably?’  And  he 
“said, c Peaceably:  I  am  come  to  sacrifice  unto  the  Lord. 
“ ‘  Sanctify  yourselves,  and  come  with  me  to  the  sac- 
“ ( rifice.’  ” 1 

When  we  read  of  that  apparition,  in  which  he  was 
evoked  after  death,  as  he  had  been  known  in  life,  there 
was  something  terrific,  yet  venerable,  in  his  aspect ; 
“  I  see  a  god  ascending  out  of  the  earth.” 2  His  outward 
His  long  Nazarite  hair,  now  white  with  age,3  aPPearance- 
marked  him  from  a  distance  to  he  the  old  gray-headed 
seer.  The  little  mantle4  which  his  mother  gave  him, 
reaching  down  to  his  feet,  had  from  his  earliest  years 
marked  him  out  as  an  almost  royal  personage ;  and  the 
same  peculiar  robe,  in  extended  proportions,  wrapped 
round  him,  was  his  badge  to  the  end.  On  its  skirt 
Saul  had  laid  hold  when  he  had  last  parted  from  Sam¬ 
uel  at  Gilgal.  By  its  folds,  he  recognized  him  in  the 
vision  at  Endor. 

II.  Such  was  Samuel,  as  the  last  representative  of 
the  ancient  mediaeval  Church  of  Judaism.  But  The  first  of 

i  i  the  order  of 

there  was  another  relation  inseparably  blended  prophets, 
with  this,  in  which  he  must  be  regarded  as  the  first 
representative  of  the  new  epoch  which  was  now  dawn¬ 
ing  on  his  country.  He  is  explicitly  described  as  “  Sam¬ 
uel  the  Prophet.”  “  All  the  prophets  from  Samuel  and 
“ those  that  follow  after!'  “He  gave  them  judges  until 
“  Samuel  the  Prophet  ” 5  We  have  already  seen  the  lower 
and  more  limited  sense,  in  which  he  might  be  so  called, 
as  the  oracle  of  his  neighborhood  or  of  his  country  in 
the  various  difficulties,  great  or  small,  which  drove  them 
to  consult  him.  We  are  even  enabled  to  observe  the 


1  1  Sam.  xvi.  4,  5.  ently  used  throughout  for  Samuel’s 

2  Ibid,  xxviii.  13.  dress,  1  Sam.  ii.  19;  xv.  27;  xxvlii. 

3  Ibid.  xii.  2.  14.  See  “  Mantle  ”  in  Diet,  of  Bible. 

4  The  Hebrew  word  me-il ,  persist-  5  Acts  iii.  24  ;  xiii.  20. 


438 


SAMUEL. 


Lect.  XVIII. 


special  means  by  which  he  received  the  revelations 
which  thus  first  gained  for  him  the  reverence  of  his 
countrymen.  “  By  dreams,  by  Urim,  and  by  prophets,” 
we  are  told,1  were  the  three  especial  channels  by  which 
in  those  days  “  the  Lord  answered  ”  to  those  that  in¬ 
quired  of  Him.  By  the  first  of  these,  we  can  hardly 
doubt,  it  is  intended  to  be  intimated  that  Samuel  re¬ 
ceived  and  delivered  his  early  warnings.  “The  word  of 
“  the  Lord  was  precious  in  those  days  —  there  was  no 
“  open  vision.” 2  It  was  in  the  stillness  of  the  night, 
just  before  the  early  dawn,  that  Samuel  first  heard 
Revelation.  the  Divine  Voice.  That  voice  and  those  visions 
still  continued.  “The  Lord  revealed  himself  to  Samuel”3 
It  is,  with  perhaps  one  exception,  the  earliest  instance 
of  the  use  of  the  word  which  has  since  become  the 
name  for  all  Divine  communication.  “The  Lord  mir 
“  covered  the  car”  —  such  is  the  literal  expression ;  a 
touching  and  significant  figure,  taken  from  the  man¬ 
ner  in  which  the  possessor  of  a  secret  moves  back  the 
long  hair  of  his  friend,  and  whispers  into  the  ear  thus 
laid  bare  the  word  that  no  one  else  may  hear.  It  is 
a  figure  which  precisely  expresses  the  most  universal 
and  philosophical  idea  conveyed  by  the  term  “  Revelation ,” 
thence  appropriated  in  the  theological  language  both  of 
East  and  West.  “The  Father  of  Truth”  (says  an  em¬ 
inent  scholar,  indicating  his  own  use  of  this  phrase  to 
describe  the  mission  of  the  Semitic  races)  “  chooses 
“  His  own  prophets,  and  He  speaks  to  them  in  a  voice 
“stronger  than  the  voice  of  thunder.  It  is  the  same 
“inner  voice  through  which  God  speaks  to  all  of  us. 
“  That  voice  may  dwindle  away,  and  become  hardly 
“audible;  it  may  lose  its  divine  accent  and  sink  into 
“  the  language  of  worldly  prudence ;  but  it  may  also 


1  1  Sam.  xxviii.  6. 


2  Ibid.  iii.  1. 


3  Ibid.  iii.  21. 


Lect.  XVIII. 


“SAMUEL  THE  SEER.” 


439 


“from  time  to  time  assume  its  real  nature  with  the 
“chosen  of  God,  and  sound  into  their  ears  as  a  voice 
“  from  Heaven.  A  ‘  divine  instinct  ’  would  neither  be 
“an  appropriate  name  for  what  is  a  gift  or  grace  ac- 
“  corded  hut  to  few,  nor  would  it  he  a  more  intelligible 
“  word  than  ‘  special  Revelation.’  ” 1 

Through  these  revelations,  the  child  first  and  then 
the  man,  became  “  Samuel  the  Seer.”  By  that  «  Samuel 
ancient  name,  older  than  any  other  designa- the  Seer  ” 
tion  of  the  Prophetic  office,  he  was  known  in  his  own 
as  in  after-times.  “  I  am  the  Seer ,”  was  his  answer 
to  those  who  asked,  “  Is  the  Seer  here  ?  ”  “  Where  is 

“  the  Seer's  house  ?  ” 2  “  Samuel  the  Seer  ”  is  the  name 
by  which  he  is  known  in  the  books  of  Chronicles,  as 
the  counsellor  of  Saul  and  David.3  And,  as  if  in  a 
distorted  reminiscence  of  his  peculiar  gift  of  second 
sight,  —  of  insight  into  the  secrets  of  Heaven  and  of 
the  future, — Samuel  is  the  character  selected  in  Mussul¬ 
man  traditions  as  the  first  revealer  of  the  mvsteries 

i/ 

of  the  nocturnal  flight  of  Mahomet  from  Mecca  to 
Jerusalem.4  But  it  was  in  a  much  higher  and  more 
important  sense  than  as  a  mere  “  seer”  of  visions,  that 
Samuel  appears  as  preeminently  “  The  Prophet.”  The 
passages  already  quoted  from  the  New  Testament  in¬ 
dicate  to  us,  and  Augustine  in  his  “  De  Civitate  Dei,” s 
has  well  caught  the  idea,  that  he  is  the  beginning  of 
that  Prophetical  dispensation,  which  ran  parallel  with 
the  Monarchy  from  the  first  to  the  last  king,  and  to¬ 
gether  with  it  forms  the  essential  characteristic  of  the 
whole  of  the  coming  period.  “  Hoc  itaque  tern  pus,  ex 
“  quo  Sanctus  Samuel  prophetare  coepit,  et  deinceps 

1  Quoted  from  the  same  Essay  of  3  1  Chron.  ix.  22 ;  xxvi.  28. 

Professor  Muller  already  cited  in  Lee-  4  Weil’s  Legends,  145. 
ture  I.  p.  17.  5  Civ.  Dei ,  xvii.  1. 

2  1  Sam.  ix.  11,  18, 19. 


440 


SAMUEL. 


Lect.  XVIII 


The 
Schools 
of  the 


“  donee  populus  Israel  in  Babyloniam  captivus  ducere- 
“  tur  ....  totum  est  tempus  Prophetarum.” 1  It 
was  from  Samuel’s  time  that  the  succession  was  never 
broken.  Even  the  Mussulman  legends  delight  to  make 
him  the  herald  of  all  the  Prophets,  down  to  the  last, 
that  were  to  come  after  him. 

In  many  ways  does  this  origination  of  the  line  of 
Prophets  centre  in  Samuel.  We  may  trace  back  to 
him  the  institution  even  in  its  outward  form  and 
fashion.  In  his  time  we  first  hear  of  what  in 
modern  phraseology  are  called  the  Schools  of 
Prophets.  pie  pr0phets.  Whatever  be  the  precise  mean¬ 
ing  of  the  peculiar  word,  which  now  came  first  into 
use  as  the  designation  of  these  companies,  it  is  evi¬ 
dent  that  their  immediate  mission  consisted  in  utter¬ 
ing  religious  hymns  or  songs,  accompanied  by  musical 
instruments  —  psaltery,  tabret,  pipe  and  harp,  and  cym¬ 
bals.2  In  them,  as  in  the  few  solitary  instances  of 
their  predecessors,  the  characteristic  element  was  that 
the  silent  seer  of  visions  found  an  articulate  voice, 
gushing  forth  in  a  rhythmical  flow,  which  at  once 
riveted  the  attention  of  the  hearer.3  These,  or  such 
as  these,  were  the  gifts  which  under  Samuel  were  now 
organized,  if  one  may  so  say,  into  a  system.  The 
spots  where  they  were  chiefly  gathered,  even  in  latter 
times,  were  more  or  less  connected  with  their  founder ; 
Bethel  and  Gilgal.  But  the  chief  place  where  they 
appear  in  his  own  lifetime  is  his  own  birthplace  and 
residence,  Ramah,  Ramathaim-zophim,  “  the  height,” 
“  the  double  height  of  the  watchmen.”  From  this  or 
from  some  neighboring  height  they  might  be  seen 
descending,  in  a  long  line  or  chain,4  which  gave  its 

1  See  Lecture  XIX.  4  The  word  used  is  Chebel ,  “  rope,” 

2  1  Sam.  x.  5  ;  1  Chron.  xxv.  1-8.  “  string  ”  (LXX.  x°P°c)  5  1  Sam.  x.  5, 

3  See  Lecture  XIX.  10. 


Lect.  XVIII.  THE  SCHOOLS  OF  THE  PROPHETS. 


441 


name  to  their  company,  with  “psaltery,  harp,  tabret, 
pipe,  and  cymbals.”  Or  by  the  dwellings,  the  leafy 
huts  as  they  were  in  later  times,  on  the  hill- side  — 
“  Naioth  in  Ramah  ”  —  they  were  settled  in  a  congre¬ 
gation1  (such  is  the  word  in  the  original),  a  church 
as  it  were  within  a  church,  and  “  Samuel  stood  appointed 2 
over  them.”  Under  the  shadow  of  his  name  they 
dwelt  as  within  a  charmed  circle.  From  them  went 
forth  an  influence  which  awed  and  inspired  even  the 
wild  and  reckless  soldiers  of  that  lawless  age.3  Amongst 
them  we  find  the  first  authors  distinctly  named,  in 
Hebrew  literature,  of  actual  books  which  descended4 
to  later  generations,  and  gathered  up  the  recollections 
of  their  own  or  of  former  times.  Song,  and  music, 
and  dance  were  interwoven  in  some  sacred  union, 
difficult  for  us  to  conceive  in  these  western  or  north¬ 
ern  regions,  yet  not  without  illustrations  even  at  the 
present  day  from  the  religious  observances  of  Spain 
and  of  Arabia.  But,  unlike  the  dances  of  Seville  and 
Cairo,  the  mystical  songs  and  ecstasies  of  these  Pro¬ 
phetic  Schools  were  trained  to  ends  much  nobler  than 
any  mere  ceremonial  observance.  Thither  in  that  age 
of  change  and  dissolution  Samuel  gathered  round  him 
all  that  was  generous  and  devout  in  the  people  of 
God.  David,  the  shepherd  warrior  and  wandering 
outlaw  —  Saul,  the  wild  and  wayward  king  —  Heman, 

1  LXX.  ttjv  kKKljjmav,  1  Sam.  xix.  Judges,  Ruth,  the  Pentateuch,  and 

20.  even  the  two  books  which  bear  his 

2  E iarrjKei  nadeoTriicdg ;  1  Sam.  xix.  name.  But  of  the  authorship  of 

20.  these  writings  there  is  no  express 

3  1  Sam.  xix.  20,  21.  mention,  and  therefore  no  decisive 

4  The  Psalms  of  David,  and  the  proof,  however  much  he  may,  with 
biographies  written  by  Samuel,  Gad,  probability,  be  supposed  to  have  con 
and  Nathan.  (1  Chron.  xxix.  29.)  tributed  towards  the  composition  of 
Various  books  of  the  Old  Testament  some  of  them. 

nave  been  ascribed  to  Samuel  —  the 

56 


442 


SAMUEL. 


Lect.  XVIII 


the  grandson  of  Samuel  himself/  chief  singer,  after¬ 
wards,  in  David’s  court,  and  known  especially  as  the 
king’s  seer  —  Gad,  the  devoted  companion  of  David 
in  his  exile  —  Nathan,  his  stern  reprover  in  after-times, 
and  the  wise  counsellor  of  David’s  wise  son  —  all,  how¬ 
ever  different  their  characters  and  stations,  seem  to 
have  found  a  home  within  those  sacred  haunts,  all 
caught  the  same  divine  inspiration;  all  were,  for  the 
time  at  least,  drawn  together  by  that  invigorating  and 
elevating  atmosphere. 

I  may  be  forgiven,  if  for  a  moment  before  dwelling 
in  detail  on  what  belongs  to  the  special  age  and 
country,  I  call  attention  to  the  fact  that  this  is  the 
first  direct  mention,  the  first  express  sanction,  not 
merely  of  regular  arts  of  instruction  and  education, 
but  of  regular  societies  formed  for  that  purpose  —  of 
schools,  of  colleges,  of  universities.  Long  before  Plato 
had  gathered  his  disciples  round  him  in  the  olive 
grove,  or  Zeno  in  the  Portico,  these  institutions  had 
sprung  up  under  Samuel  in  Judea. 

It  is  always  interesting  in  ecclesiastical  history  to  in¬ 
dicate  the  successive  moments  at  which  the  successive 
ideas  and  institutions,  afterwards  to  be  developed,  first 
came  into  existence.  And  here,  in  Oxford,  it  is  im¬ 
possible  not  to  note  with  peculiar  interest  the  rise  of 
these,  as  they  may  be  truly  called,  the  first  places 
of  regular  religious  education.  They  present  to  us, 
even  in  detail,  the  same  fixedness  of  local  continuity, 
which  so  remarkably  distinguishes  our  schools  and 
universities  from  the  shifting  philosophical  societies  of 
Greece ;  at  Bethel  and  at  Gilgal,  if  not  at  Kamah, 
the  schools  of  the  Prophets  are  found  in  the  time  of 
Elijah  where  they  were  in  the  time  of  Samuel,  even 

1  Son  of  Joel,  1  Cliron.  vi.  33  ;  xv.  17  ;  xxv.  5. 


Lect.  XVIII.  THE  SCHOOLS  OF  THE  PROPHETS. 


443 


as  our  own  university,  and  our  own  colleges,  still 
flourish  on  the  ground  chosen  ages  ago  by  Alfred 
and  by  Walter  de  Merton.  They  present  to  us,  also, 
so  far  as  we  know  anything  of  their  constitution, 
something  of  the  same  large  influence,  so  often  ob¬ 
served  amongst  ourselves ;  the  effect  exercised  rather 
by  the  general  atmosphere  and  society  of  the  place, 
than  by  its  special  instructions.  Of  the  information 
imparted  by  Samuel,  or  by  the  fathers  of  the  school 
of  the  Prophets,1  we  know  hardly  anything.  We  see 
only  that  there  was  a  contagion  of  goodness,  of  en¬ 
thusiasm,  of  energy,  which  even  those  who  came 
with  hostile  or  indifferent  minds,  such  as  Saul  and 
the  messengers  of  Saul,  found  it  almost  impossible  to 
resist ;  they,  too,  were  wrapt  into  the  vortex  of  in¬ 
spiration,  and  the  by-standers  exclaimed  with  astonish¬ 
ment,  “  Is  Saul  also  among  the  prophets  ?  ”  How  like 
to  the  spell  exercised  by  the  local  genius  of  our 
English  Universities,  insensibly,  unaccountably  exer¬ 
cised  over  many,  who  would  not  be  able  to  say  how 
or  whence  they  had  gained  it ;  how  like  to  the  in¬ 
fluences  passing  to  and  fro  amongst  us,  for  good  or 
evil,  from  the  example,  the  characters,  the  spirit  of 
our  companions ;  far  more  potent  than  lectures,  or 
precepts,  or  sermons.  “I  have  learned  much  from  my 
“  Masters,  more  from  my  companions,  most  of  all 
“  from  my  scholars.” 2  And,  further,  if  this  be  so, 
the  peculiar  circumstances  of  the  rise  of  the  Pro¬ 
phetic  Schools  of  Israel  may  well  point  out  The  Pro. 
to  us  one  special  object,  at  least,  of  all  such  ^of™18' 
seats  of  education  everywhere.  To  mediate  SamueL 
between  the  old  and  the  new;  to  maintain  a  current 


i  See  Lecture  XIX. 


2  Sayings  of  a  Rabbi  quoted  in 
Cowley’s  Davideis ,  Notes,  p.  40. 


444 


SAMUEL. 


Lect.  XVIII. 


of  independent  thought  and  feeling  amidst  the  pres¬ 
sure  of  lower  influences ;  to  distinguish  between  that 
which  is  temporal  and  that  which  is  eternal  —  this  is 
the  mission  of  institutions  like  ours ;  this  was  the 
mission  of  Samuel,  and  of  the  schools  of  which  he 
was  the  Founder. 

Let  us  take  these  points  in  their  order. 

1.  To  mediate  between  the  old  and  the  new.  —  This, 
His  media-  as  I  have  before  intimated,  was  indeed  the 
tween  the  peculiar  position  of  Samuel.  He  was  at  once 
new.  the  last  of  the  Judges  and  the  inaugurator 
of  the  first  of  the  Kings.  Take  the  whole  of  the  nar¬ 
rative  together;  take  the  story  first  of  his  opposition, 
and  then  of  his  acquiescence,  in  the  establishment  of 
the  monarchy.  Both  together  bring  us  to  a  just  im¬ 
pression  of  the  double  aspect  in  which  he  appears ;  of 
the  two-sided  sympathy  which  enabled  him  to  unite 
together  the  passing  and  the  coming  epoch.  The 
misdemeanors  of  his  own  sons  —  the  first  appearance 
in  them  of  the  grasping  avaricious1  character  which 
in  later  ages  has  thrown  so  black  a  shadow  over  the 
Jewish  character  —  precipitated  the  catastrophe  which 
had  been  long  preparing.  The  people  demanded  a 
king.  Josephus  describes  the  shock  to  Samuel’s  mind, 
cc  because  of  his  inborn  sense  of  justice,  because  of 
“  his  hatred  of  kings,  as  so  far  inferior  to  the  aris- 


“  tocratic  rule,  which  conferred  a  godlike  character  on 
"  those  who  lived  under  it.”2  For  the  whole  night 
he  lay,  we  are  told,  fasting  and  sleepless,  in  the 
depths  of  doubt  and  perplexity.  In  the  visions  of 
that  night,3  and  the  announcement  of  them  .on  the 
following  day,  is  given  the  dark  side  of  the  new  in- 


1  Their  crimes  were  bribery  and  ex¬ 
orbitant  usury ,  1  Sam.  viii.  4  (LXX.). 


2  Ant.  vi.  3,  §  3. 

3  Ibid. 


Lect.  XVIII. 


HIS  MEDIATION. 


445 


stitution.  On  the  other  hand,  his  acceptance  of  the 
change  is  no  less  clearly  marked  in  the  story  of  his 
reception  of  Saul.  In  the  first  meeting  no  word  is 
breathed  to  break  the  impression  that  God1  is  with 
the  new  Euler,  and,  in  his  final  coronation  as  king, 
there  is  no  check  to  the  joy  with  which  the  whole 
nation,  and,  according  to  the  Septuagint,  Samuel  him¬ 
self,  “ rejoiced  greatly.”2  In  the  final  address  is  rep¬ 
resented  the  mixed  feeling  with  which,  after  having 
forewarned  and  struggled  and  resisted,  he  at  last 
bows  to  the  inevitable  course  of  events,  and  retires 
gradually  to  make  room  for  a  new  order,  of  which  he 
could  but  partially  understand  the  meaning.  He 
parted  from  the  people,  not  with  curses,  but  with 
blessings :  “  God  forbid  that  I  should  sin  against  the 
“  Lord  by  ceasing  to  pray  for  you ;  but  I  will  teach 
“  you  the  good  and  the  right  way.”  He  parted  from 
Saul,  not  in  anger,  but  in  sorrow.  “  Nevertheless 
“  Samuel  mourned  for  Saul.”  He  who  had  begun  by 
denouncing  the  Monarchy  as  fraught  with  evil,  ended 
by  becoming  the  protector  and  counsellor  of  him  who 
was  to  be  its  chief  glory  and  support.3  Out  of  the 
dark  period  in  which  his  early  years  had  been  spent, 
arose  through  his  interposition  a  higher  and  a  nobler 
life.  To  Saul  succeeded  David  and  Solomon;  and  in 
their  reigns  was  seen  a  fulfilment  of  God’s  kingdom 
such  as  could  not  be  understood  by  those  to  whom 
there  was  no  king  in  Israel,  who  did  what  w7as  right 
in  their  own  eyes ;  to  whom  the  Psalms  were  as  yet 
unknown ;  to  whom  Prophecy  came  only  by  imper¬ 
fect  and  distant  glimpses ;  to  whom  the  highest  type 
of  the  Messiah’s  reign  in  the  person  of  David  and  his 
son  was  a  thing  inconceivable. 

1  1  Sam.  x.  7  2  Ibid.  xi.  15.  3  Ibid.  xii.  23  ;  xv.  35. 


446 


SAMUEL. 


Lect.  XVIII 


Such  an  epoch  of  perplexity,  of  transition,  of 
change,  as  that  which  witnessed  the  passage  from 
the  first  age  of  the  Jewfish  Church  to  the  second, 
has  been  rarely  experienced  in  any  age  of  the  Church 
since.  Yet  there  have  been  times  more  or  less  simi¬ 
lar;  the  passage  from  every  generation  to  the  one 
that  succeeds  has  difficulties  more  or  less  correspond¬ 
ing.  In  every  such  passage  there  may  be  or  there 
ought  to  be  characters  more  or  less  like  that  of 
Samuel,  if  the  transition  is  to  be  safely  effected.  Of 
all  the  characters  in  the  old  dispensation,  Samuel  has 
in  later  times,  both  by  friends  and  opponents,  been 
the  most  often  misrepresented  and  misunderstood.  Of 
all  characters  in  later  times,  those  who  undertake  the 
difficult  task  of  Samuel  are  the  most  likely  to  be 
misunderstood  or  misrepresented  still.  They  are  at- 
tacked  from  both  sides ;  they  are  charged  with  not 
going  far  enough  or  with  going  too  far;  they  are 
charged  with  saying  too  much  or  with  saying  too 
little;  they  are  regarded  from  either  partial  point  of 
view,  and  not  from  one  which  takes  in  the  whole. 
They  cannot  be  comprehended  at  a  glance  like  Moses 
or  Elijah  or  Isaiah,  and  therefore  they  are  thrust 
aside.  There  have  been  those  who  have  trod  the 
same  thankless  path  in  former  times  of  the  Christian 
Church.  Athanasius,  in  the  moderate  counsels  of  his 
old  age,  in  his  attempts  to  reconcile  the  contending 
factions  of  Christians  in  the  Council  of  Alexandria, 
was,  for  this  reason,  fitly  regarded  by  Basil  as  the 
Samuel  of  the  Church  of  his  days.1  In  later  times, 
even  in  our  own,  many  names  spring  to  our  recollec¬ 
tion,  of  those  who  have  trodden  or  (in  different  de¬ 
grees,  some  known,  and  some  unknown)  are  treading 

1  Basil,  Ep.  82. 


Lect.  XVIII. 


HIS  INDEPENDENCE. 


447 


the  same  thankless  path  in  the  Church  of  Germany, 
in  the  Church  of  France,  in  the  Church  of  Russia,  in 
the  Church  of  England.  Wherever  they  are,  and 
whosoever  they  may  be,  and  howsoever  they  may  be 
neglected,  or  assailed,  or  despised,  they,  like  their 
great  prototype  and  likeness,  in  the  Jewish  Church, 
are  the  silent  healers  who  bind  up  the  wounds  of 
their  age  in  spite  of  itself;  they  are  the  good  physi¬ 
cians  who  knit  together  the  dislocated  bones  of  a 
.  disjointed  time ;  they  are  the  reconcilers  who  turn 
the  hearts  of  the  children  to  the  fathers,  or  of  the 
fathers  to  the  children.  They  have  but  little  praise 
and  reward  from  the  partisans  who  are  loud  in  indis¬ 
criminate  censure  and  applause.  But,  like  Samuel, 
they  have  a  far  higher  reward,  in  the  Davids  who 
are  silently  strengthened  and  nurtured  by  them  in 
Naioth  of  Ramah,  —  in  the  glories  of  a  new  age 
which  shall  be  ushered  in  peacefully  and  happily 
after  they  have  been  laid  in  the  grave. 

In  two  important  ways,  this  character  of  mediation, 
if  I  may  so  call  it,  was  discernible  in  the  Prophetical 
office  generally,  and,  as  far  as  we  can  see,  was  spe¬ 
cially  exemplified  in  Samuel. 

.  First,  we  observe  in  his  position  and  character  that 
independence  of  spirit  which  has  sometimes  His  inde_ 
caused  the  Prophets,  and  himself  in  particular,  Pendence- 
to  be  regarded  almost  as  the  demagogues,  the  trib¬ 
unes,  of  the  Jewish  people.  The  song  ascribed  to  his 
mother  at  his  birth  well  expresses  the  new  element, 
which  was  in  him  to  break  out  and  run  across  the 
usual  tenor  of  Jewish  society.  “  The  bows  of  the 
“  mighty  men  are  broken,  and  they  that  stumbled  are 
££  girded  with  strength.”  “  The  Lord  maketh  poor  and 
(£  maketh  rich ;  He  bringeth  low  and  lifteth  up.” 1  Stern 

1  1  Sam.  ii.  4,  7. 


448 


SAMUEL. 


Lect.  XVIIL 


rebuke  of  the  popular  will,  stern  defiance  of  regal 
tyranny,  stern  denunciation  of  sacerdotal  corruption, 
marked  the  entrance  of  the  Prophetic  dispensation 
into  the  Church.  To  be  above  the  world,  to  derive 
courage  and  strength  from  a  higher  source  than  the 
world,  was  the  first  guarantee  for  a  due  discharge  of 
the  Prophetic  mission.  “  There  is  none  holy  as  the 
a  Lord  •  for  there  is  none  beside  thee ;  neither  is  there 
“  any  rock  like  our  God.” 1 

But,  secondly,  in  Samuel  as  afterwards,  this  attitude 
of  solitary  defiance  was  not  the  attitude  of  Priestly 
interest  or  ambition.  Of  all  the  “  vulgar  errors  ”  in 
His  anti-  sacred  history,  none  is  greater  than  that  which 

sacerdotal 

character,  represents  the  conflict  of  Samuel  with  Saul  as 
a  conflict  between  the  regal  and  sacerdotal  power.  It 
is  doubtful  even  whether  he  was  of  Levitical  descent ; 2 
it  is  certain  that  he  was  not  a  Priest.  “  Samuel  Pro- 
“  pheta  fuit,  Judex  fuit,  Levita  fuit,  non  Pontifex,  ne 
“  Sacerdos  quidem,”  is  the  just  remark  of  S.  Jerome.3 
And  in  accordance  with  this  we  may  observe  that 
Samuel  himself,  after  the  fall  of  Shiloh,  dwelt  not  at 
Gibeon  or  Nob,  the  seat  of  the  Tabernacle  and  the 
Priesthood,  but  at  Ramah.  At  Ramah,  and  at  Bethel, 
and  at  Gilgal,  not  at  Hebron  or  Anathoth,  were  the 
Prophetic  schools.  He  reproved  Saul  the  King,  only 
in  the  same  way  as,  in  his  early  childhood,  he  had 
reproved  Eli  the  Priest.  The  guilt  of  Saul’s  sacrifice 
at  Gilgal  was  not  that  it  infringed  on  the  province 
of  the  Priest :  Saul  as  king  had  the  same  right  to 
sacrifice  as  David  and  Solomon  had  afterwards.  It 
was  that  he  in  his  rash  superstition  broke  through 


1  1  Sam.  ii.  2.  Ps.  lxxviii.  1),  Ewald  (ii.  549)  by  sup- 

2  Elkanah  in  1  Sam.  i.  1,  is  an  posing  that  the  Levites  were  occa- 
Ephrathite  or  Ephraimite ;  in  1  Chron.  sionally  incorporated  into  the  tribes 
vi.  22,  23,  he  is  a  Levite.  This  has  amongst  which  they  lived. 

been  explained  by  Hengstenberg  (on  3  Adv.  Jovinianum. 


# 


4 


Lect.  XVIII.  HIS  GRADUAL  GROWTH.  449 

the  moral  restraint  imposed  upon  him  by  the  Prophet. 
And  in  the  yet  more  memorable  scene,  where  Sam¬ 
uel,  as  the  stern  executioner  of  judgment  on  the 
captive  Agag,  protests  against  the  misplaced  mildness 
of  Saul,  his  words  rise  far  above  the  special  occasion, 
and  contain  the  key-note  of  the  long  remonstrance 
of  the  Prophets  in  all  subsequent  times  against  an 
exaggerated  estimate  of  ceremonial  above  obedience 
The  very  flow  of  the  words  recalls  to  us  the  form  as 
well  as  the  spirit  of  Amos  and  Isaiah.  66  Hath  the 
66  Lord  as  great  delight  in  burnt  offerings  and  sacrifices 
“  as  in  obeying  the  voice  of  the  Lord  ?  Behold  to 
“  obey  is  better  than  sacrifice,  and  to  hearken  than 
“  the  fat  of  rams.  For  the  sin  of  witchcraft  is 
“  rebellion,  and  iniquity  and  idolatry  are  stubborn- 
“  ness.  .  .  .  '  The  Strength  of  Israel  will  not  lie 

“  nor  repent ;  for  He  is  not  a  man  that  He  should 
“  repent.” 1 

There  is  one  more  aspect  in  which  Samuel’s  life 
may  be  viewed.  It  was  not  merely  as  the  chief  leader 
of  the  People  wdien  they  passed  into  the  second  stage 
of  their  national  history,  nor  as  the  Founder  of  the 
Schools  of  the  Prophets,  that  he  is  especially  known 
as  u  Samuel  the  Prophet.”  It  was,  because,  unlike 
Moses  or  Deborah,  or  any  previous  saint  or  His  gradual 
teacher  of  the  Jewish  Church,  he  grew  up  growth‘ 
for  this  office  from  his  earliest  years.  He  was  (e  the 
Prophet”  from  first  to  last.  Even  in  his  parentage, 
we  find  a  slight  but  significant  indication  of  his  prepa¬ 
ration  for  it.  His  mother,  as  we  have  seen,  was  almost 
a  prophetess ;  the  word  Zophim ,  as  the  affix  of  his 
birthplace  Ramathaim ,  has  been  explained,  not  unrea¬ 
sonably,  to  mean  “  seers,”  or  “  watchmen  ;  ”  and  Elka- 

1  1  Sam.  xv.  22,  23,  29. 

57 


•  %  ^ 


450 


SAMUEL. 


Lect.  XVIII. 


nah  his  father  is,  in  ancient  Jewish  tradition,1  called 
“  a  disciple  of  the  Prophets.”  This  early  education 
for  his  office  is,  after  all,  the  picture  of  Samuel  most 
familiar  to  our  thoughts.  It  is  not  the  terrible  figure 
which  rose  up  before  the  apostate  king  in  the  cave 
of  Endor  —  the  stern  old  man,  ascending  like  a  god 
from  the  earth,  with  threatening  and  disquieted  coun¬ 
tenance,  with  the  fearful  aspect  of  him  who  had  pre¬ 
sented  the  mangled  remains  of  Agag  as  a  sacrifice  at 
Gilgal,  who  had  called  down  thunder  from  heaven, 
who  had  shaken  off  Saul  from  the  skirts  of  that  pro¬ 
phetic  mantle  with  which  his  face  was  veiled.  It  is 
not  this  shape,  grand  and  striking  though  it  be,  in 
which  Samuel  usually  rises  to  our  recollections.  It  is 
as  the  little  child  in  his  linen  ephod,  and  in  the  little 
“  mantle  ”  which  his  mother  brought  him  from  year 
to  year ;  the  child  Samuel  sleeping  in  the  tabernacle 
of  Shiloh,  in  the  simple  sleep  of  innocence,  unknowing 
of  the  sins  which  went  on  around  him ;  roused  by 
the  mysterious  voice,  listening  in  deep  reverence  to 
its  awful  message.  This  is  the  image  of  Samuel  which 
is  enshrined  to  us  in  Christian  art ;  this  is  the  image 
which  most  appeals  to  our  general  sympathy,  and  on 
which  the  Sacred  Text  lays  the  most  peculiar  stress. 
On  these  early  chapters  of  the  Books  of  Samuel,  we 
are  told  that  in  his  gentler  moments  Luther  used  to 
dwell  with  the  tenderness  which  formed  the  occasional 
counterpoise  to  the  ruder  passions  and  enterprises  of 
his  general  life.  Ever  and  anon  amidst  the  crimes 
and  terrors  of  the  narrative  of  that  troubled  time ; 
athwart  the  sins  and  corruptions  of  the  Priesthood, 
and  the  passions  and  the  calamities  of  the  nation,  the 
scene  of  the  Sacred  Story  is,  as  it  were,  drawn  back, 

1  Targum  of  Jonathan  on  1  Sam.  i.  1. 


Lect.  XVIII. 


HIS  GRADUAL  GROWTH. 


451 


and  reveals  to  us,  in  successive  glimpses,  the  one 
peaceful,  consoling,  hopeful  image,  and  we  hear  the 
same  gentle  undersong  of  childlike,  devoted,  contin¬ 
uous  goodness.  “  His  mother  said,  I  will  bring  him 
“  that  he  may  appear  before  the  Lord,  and  there  abide 
“forever” 1  “ And  she  brought  him  unto  the  House 

“of  the  Lord  in  Shiloh,  and  the  child  ivas  young? 2  And 
she  said,  “  For  this  child  I  prayed ;  and  the  Lord 
“  hath  given  me  the  petition  which  I  asked  of  him. 
“  Therefore  also  I  have  lent  him  to  the  Lord ;  as  long 
“  as  lie  liveth ,  he  shall  be  lent  to  the  Lord .  And  he  wor- 
“  shipped  the  Lord  there?  3  “  And  the  child  did  minister 

“  unto  the  Lord  before  Eli  the  Priest.” 4  (“  The  sons 

“  of  Eli  were  men  of  Belial ;  .  .  .  and  the  sin  of  the 
“  young  men  was  very  great  before  the  Lord.  .  .  .  ) 
“  But  Samuel  ministered  before  the  Lord ,  being  a  child.” 6 
“  And  the  child  Samuel  grew  before  the  Lord?  (“  Now 
“  Eli  was  very  old,  and  heard  all  that  his  sons  did  to 
“  all  Israel ;  and  said  unto  them,  Why  do  ye  such 
“  things  ?  .  .  .  Notwithstanding  they  hearkened  not 
“  unto  the  voice  of  their  father,  because  the  Lord 
“  would  slay  them”)  “  And  the  child  Samuel  grew  on , 
“  and  was  in  favor  both  with  the  Lord  and  with  men.” 6 
(“  There  came  a  man  of  God  unto  Eli  and  said  .  .  . 
“  Wherefore  honorest  thou  thy  sons  above  me,  to  make 
“  yourselves  fat  with  the  chiefest  of  all  the  offerings 
“  of  Israel  my  people  ?  And  the  child  Samuel  ministered 
“  unto  the  Lord  before  Eli.” 7  “  And  Samuel  grew  and 

“  the  Lord  was  with  him,  and  did  let  none  of  his  words 
“fall  to  the  ground,  and  all  Israel  from  Dan  to  Beer* 

1  1  Sam.  i.  22.  4  Ibid.  ii.  11. 

2  Ibid.  24.  5  Ibid.  12,  17,  18. 

3  Ibid.  27,28.  This  act  of  worship  6  Ibid.  21-26. 

on  the  part  of  the  child  is  omitted  in  7  Ibid.  27-36  ;  iii.  1. 
the  LXX. 


452 


SAMUEL. 


Lect.  XVIII. 


“  sheba  knew  that  Samuel  was  established  to  be  a  prophet 
“  of  the  Lord.” 1 

It  is  this  contrast  of  the  silent,  inward,  unconscious 
growth  of  Samuel,  with  the  violence  and  profligacy 
of  the  times,  that  renders  this  narrative  the  first  ex¬ 
ample,  the  first  chapter,  it  may  almost  be  called,  of 
the  like  characteristic  of  the  history  of  the  Christian 
Church,  in  so  many  stages  of  its  existence.  It  is  also 
the  expression  of  a  universal  truth.  Samuel  is  the 
main  example,  as  we  have  seen,  of  the  moderator  and 
mediator  of  two  epochs.  He  is,  also,  the  first  instance 
of  a  Prophet  gradually  raised  for  his  office  from  the 
earliest  dawn  of  reason.  His  work  and  his  life  are 
the  counterparts  of  each  other.  With  all  the  recollec¬ 
tions  of  the  ancient  sanctuary  impressed  upon  his 
mind,  —  with  the  voice  of  God  sounding  in  his  ears, 
not,  as  in  the  case  of  the  elder  leaders  and  teachers 
of  his  people,  amidst  the  roar  of  thunder  and  the  clash 
of  war,  but  in  the  still  silence  of  the  Tabernacle,  ere 
the  lamp  of  God  went  out,  —  he  was  the  more  fitted 
to  meet  the  coming  crisis,  to  become  himself  the  cen¬ 
tre  of  new  institutions,  which  should  themselves  be¬ 
come  venerable  as  those  in  which  he  had  been  him¬ 
self  brought  up.  Because  in  him  the  various  parts 
of  his  life  hung  together,  without  any  abrupt  transi¬ 
tion  ;  because  in  him  “  the  child  was  father  to  the 
man,”  and  his  days  had  been  “  bound  each  to  each 
by  natural  piety,”  therefore  he  was  especially  ordained 
to  bind  together  the  broken  links  of  two  diverging 
epochs ;  therefore  he  could  impart  to  others,  and  to 
the  age  in  which  he  lived,  the  continuity  which  he 
had  experienced  in  his  own  life;  therefore  he  could 
gather  round  him  the  better  spirits  of  his  time  by 

1  1  Sam.  iii.  19,  20. 


Lect.  XVIII. 


HIS  DEATH 


453 


that  discernment  of  "  a  pure  heart,  which  sees  through 
heaven  and  hell”  In  that  first  childlike  response, 
“  Speak,  Lord,  for  thy  servant  heareth,”  was  contained 
the  secret  of  his  strength.  When  in  each  successive 
stage  of  his  growth  the  call  waxed  louder  and  louder 
to  duties  more  and  more  arduous,  he  could  still  look 
back  without  interruption  to  the  first  time  when  it 
broke  his  midnight  slumbers ;  when,  under  the  fatherly 
counsel  of  Eli,  he  had  obeyed  its  summons,  and  found 
its  judgments  fulfilled.  He  could  still,  as  he  His  end. 
stood  before  the  people  at  Gilgal,  appeal  to  the  un¬ 
broken  purity  of  his  long  eventful  life.  Whatever 
might  have  been  the  lawless  habits  of  the  chiefs  of 
those  times,  —  Hophni,  Phinehas,  or  his  own  sons, — 
he  had  kept  aloof  from  all.  “  Behold,  I  am  old  and 
“  gray-headed,  and  I  have  walked  before  you  from  my 
“  childhood  unto  this  day .  Behold,  here  I  am ;  witness 
“  against  me  before  the  Lord.”  No  ox  or  ass  had  he 
taken  from  their  stalls;  no  bribe  to  obtain  his  judg¬ 
ment,1 —  not  even  so  much  as  a  sandal.2  It  is  this 
appeal,  and  the  universal  response  of  the  people,  that 
has  caused  Grotius  to  give  him  the  name  of  the 
Jewish  Aristides.3  And  when  the  hour  of  his  death 
came,  we  are  told  with  a  peculiar  emphasis  of  expres¬ 
sion,  that  "  all  the  Israelites,”  —  not  one  portion  or 
fragment  only,  as  might  have  been  expected  in  that 
time  of  division  and  confusion,  —  "were  gathered  to¬ 
gether”  round  him  who  had  been  the  father  of  all 
alike,  and  "  lamented  him  and  buried  him ;  ”  not  in 
any  sacred  spot  or  secluded  sepulchre,  but  in  His  grave, 
the  midst  of  the  home  which  he  had  consecrated  only 
by  his  own  long  unblemished  career,  "  in  his  house  at 

1  kt-'iXaofjia  (LXX.) ;  1  Sam.  xii.  3  Ecclus.  xlvi.  19. 

2  in odrjfm  (LXX.)  ;  1  Sam.  xii. 


454 


SAMUEL. 


Lect.  XVIIL 


Kamah.” 1  We  know  not  with  certainty  the  situation 
of  Kamah.  Of  Samuel  as  of  Moses  it  may  he  said, 
"No  man  knoweth  of  his  sepulchre  unto  this  day.” 2 
But  the  lofty  peak  above  Gibeon,  which  has  long 
borne  his  name,  has  this  feature  (in  common,  to  a  cer¬ 
tain  extent,  with  any  high  place  which  can  have  been 
the  scene  of  his  life  and  death),  that  it  overlooks  the 
whole  of  that  broad  table-land,  on  which  the  fortunes 
of  the  Jewish  monarchy  were  afterwards  unrolled. 
Its  towering  eminence,  from  which  the  pilgrims  first 
obtained  their  view  of  Jerusalem,  is  no  unfit  likeness 
of  the  solitary  grandeur  of  the  Prophet  Samuel,  living 
and  dying  in  the  very  midst  and  centre  of  the  future 
glory  of  his  country. 

Is  it  possible  to  evade  or  to  forget  the  illustration 
The  which  this  story  derives  from  the  experiences 

Samuel?  °f  education  everywhere  ?  The  venerable  sanc¬ 
tuary  which  Joshua  had  planted,  and  where 
Eleazar  had  ministered,  the  monuments  of  what  I 
have  before  termed  the  mediaeval  age  of  the  Jewish 
Church,  are  but  the  likeness,  many  times  repeated  in 
the  Christian  Church,  —  but  nowhere  more  strikingly 
than  in  England  and  in  Oxford,  —  of  the  ancient  seats 
of  education,  the  cathedrals,  the  monasteries,  the  col¬ 
leges  blending  both  together,  where  generation  after 
generation  is  trained  for  the  future  exercise  of  the 
pastoral  office.  Under  such  auspices,  both  in  the  Jew¬ 
ish  and  in  the  Christian  Church,  grow  up  Hophni  and 
Phinehas,  the  profligate  sons  of  Eli,  and  the  blameless 

1  1  Sam.  xxv.  1.  seventh  century,  is  the  needless  hy- 

2  This  spot  is  still  pointed  out  in  a  pothesis  which  has  endeavored  to 
cave  underneath  the  floor  of  the  Mus-  identify  Ramah  with  the  nameless 
sulman  mosque  of  Nebi  Samwil.  The  city  in  1  Sam.  ix.  6.  See  Mr.  Grove’s 
only  serious  objection  to  this  tradi-  article  on  Ramathaim-zophim  in  Dic¬ 
tion,  which  reaches  back  as  far  as  the  tionary  of  the  Bible 


Lect.  XVIII. 


HIS  CHARACTER. 


455 


youth  of  the  child  of  Elkanah.  Sacred  associations, 
religious  services,  are  as  deadening  and  hardening  to 
the  one,  as  they  are  elevating  and  purifying  to  the 
other. 

In  this  atmosphere,  so  charged  with  good  and  evil 
for  the  future,  not  less  impressive  is  the  lesson  of  the 
connection  between  Samuel’s  character  and  Samuel’s 

mission.  Wild  excesses  in  vouth  are  often  followed 

«/ 

by  energy,  by  zeal,  by  devotion.  We  read  it  in  the 
examples  of  Augustine,  of  Loyola,  of  John  Newton. 
Sudden  conversions  of  character  such  as  these  are 
amongst  the  most  striking  points  of  ecclesiastical  his¬ 
tory.  But  no  less  certain  is  it  that  they  are  rarely,  very 
rarely,  followed  by  moderation,  by  calmness,  by  impartial 
wisdom.  Count  the  eager  partisans  of  our  own  or  of 
other  times.  How  often  shall  we  find  that  their  early 
discipline  was  one  of  headstrong  and  violent  passion. 
How  often  shall  we  find  that  the  conversion  of  a  law¬ 
less  and  reckless  youth  issues  in  the  one-sided  and  super¬ 
stitious  zeal  which  hurries  the  ark  of  God  into  battle, 
after  the  example  of  Hophni  and  Phinehas,  —  which 
would  oppose  to  the  death  the  erection  of  the  monar¬ 
chy  and  the  rise  of  the  Prophets,  as  Hophni  and  Phine¬ 
has  in  all  probability  would  have  opposed  it,  had  they 
been  converted  and  spared. 

Whatever  else  is  gained  by  sudden  and  violent  con¬ 
versions,  this  is  lost.  Whatever  else,  on  the  other 
hand,  is  lost  by  the  absence  of  experience  of  evil,  by 
the  calm  and  even  life  which  needs  no  repentance, 
this  is  gained.  The  especial  work  of  guiding,  mod¬ 
erating,  softening,  the  jarring  counsels  of  men  is  for 
the  most  part  the  especial  privilege  of  those  who  have 
grown  up  into  matured  strength  from  early  beginnings 
of  purity  and  goodness  —  of  those  who  can  humbly 


456 


SAMUEL. 


Lect.  XVIIL 


and  thankfully  look  back  through  middle  age,  and 
youth  and  childhood,  with  no  sudden  rent  or  breach 
in  their  pure  and  peaceful  recollections. 

Samuel  is  the  chief  type,  in  ecclesiastical  history,  of 
holiness,  of  growth,  of  a  new  creation  without  conver¬ 
sion  ;  and  his  mission  is  an  example  of  the  special  mis¬ 
sions  which  such  characters  are  called  to  fulfil.  In 
proportion  as  the  different  stages  of  life  have  sprung 
naturally  and  spontaneously  out  of  each  other,  without 
any  abrupt  revulsion,  each  serves  as  a  foundation  on 
which  the  other  may  stand;  each  makes  the  foun¬ 
dation  of  the  whole  more  sure  and  stable.  In  propor¬ 
tion  as  our  own  foundation  is  thus  stable,  and  as  our 
own  minds  and  hearts  have  grown  up  gradually  and 
firmly,  without  any  violent  disturbance  or  wrench  to 
one  side  or  to  the  other;  in  that  proportion  is  it  the 
more  possible  to  view  with  calmness  and  moderation 
the  difficulties  and  differences  of  others  —  to  avail  our¬ 
selves  of  the  new  methods  and  new  characters  that 
the  advance  of  time  throws  in  our  way  —  return  from 
present  troubles  to  the  pure  and  untroubled  well  of 
our  early  years  —  to  preserve  and  to  communicate 
the  childlike  faith,  changed,  doubtless,  in  form,  but 
the  same  in  spirit,  in  which  we  first  knelt  in  humble 
prayer  for  ourselves  and  others,  and  drank  in  the  first 
impressions  of  God  and  of  Heaven.  The  call  may  come 
to  us  in  many  ways ;  it  may  tell  us  of  the  change  of 
the  priesthood,  of  the  fall  of  the  earthly  sanctuary,  of 
the  rise  of  strange  thoughts,  of  the  beginning  of  a  new 
epoch.  Happy  are  they  who,  here  or  elsewhere,  are 
able  to  perceive  the  signs  of  the  times,  and  to  an¬ 
swer  without  fear  or  trembling,  u  Speak  Lord,  for  thy 
“  servant  heareth.” 


Lect.  XIX.  HISTORY  OF  THE  PROPHETICAL  ORDER  457 


LECTUEE  XIX. 

THE  HISTORY  OF  THE  PROPHETICAL  ORDER. 

The  life  of  Samuel  is  so  marked  an  epoch  in  the 
history  of  the  Prophetical  Office,  that  this  seems  the 
fittest  place  for  the  consideration  of  an  institution, 
which,  though  it  bore  its  chief  fruits  in  the  periods 
following  on  that  just  brought  to  a  close  in  the  fore¬ 
going  Lectures,  may  yet  be  viewed  as  a  whole  in  this 
critical  moment  of  its  existence. 

It  will  accordingly  be  my  endeavor  to  describe,  first 
the  Prophetical  Order  or  Institution,  in  its  original 
historical  connection,  and,  secondly,  the  nature  of  the 
Prophetical  Teaching  in  its  relations  to  the  moral  and 
spiritual  condition  of  the  Jewish,  and,  indirectly,  of 
the  Christian  Church. 

s 

I.  Before  entering  on  the  history  of  the  order,  the 
meaning  of  the  word  “  Prophet,”  in  the  two  The  word 
sacred  languages,  must  he  exactly  defined.  !  -  - 

The  Hebrew  word  Nabi  is  derived  from  the  verb 
naba ,  which,  however,  never  occurs  in  the  ac-  Nabi. 
tive,  hut  only  in  the  passive  conjugations  of  the  verb, 
according  to  the  analogy  of  the  deponent  verbs  in 
Latin  :  —  loqui,  fari ,  vociferari ,  vaticinari ,  where  the  pas¬ 
sive  form  seems  to  indicate  that  the  speaker  is  swayed 
by  impulses  over  which  he  has  not  himself  entire  con¬ 
trol.  The  root  of  the  verb  is  said  to  be  a  word  sig¬ 
nifying  u  to  boil  or  bubble  over,”  and  is  thus  taken 

58 


458  HISTORY  OF  THE  PROPHETICAL  ORDER,  Lect.  XIX 

from  the  metaphor  of  a  fountain  bursting  forth  from 
the  heart  of  man,  into  which  God  has  poured  it.1 2  Its 
actual  meaning  is  to  pour  forth  excited  utterances ,  as  ap¬ 
pears  from  its  occasional  use  in  the  sense  of  raving? 
Even  to  this  day,  in  the  East,  the  ideas  of  prophet 
and  madman  are  closely  connected.  The  religious 
sense,  in  which,  with  these  exceptions,  the  word  is 
always  employed,  is  that  of  “speaking”  or  “singing  un¬ 
der  a  divine  afflatus  or  impulse ,”  to  which  the  peculiar 
form  of  the  word,  as  just  observed,  lends  itself.  The 
same  seems  to  be  the  general  sense  of  the  Arabic 
neby.  It  is  this  word  that  the  Seventy  translated  by 
a  Greek  term  not  of  frequent  usage  in  classical  au¬ 
thors,  but  which,  through  their  adoption  of  it,  has 
passed  into  all  modern  European  languages;  namely, 
“  Prophet.”  the  word  7 rpo'frrjrris,  “  Prophet.”  The  sense  of 
this  word  in  classical  writers  is  not  less  clearly  defined 
than  that  of  Nabi  in  Hebrew,  and,  though  not  exactly 
the  same  in  sense,  is  sufficiently  analogous  to  justify 
its  employment  by  the  Alexandrine  translators.  It  is 
always  an  interpreter  or  medium  of  the  Divine  will. 
Thus  Apollo  is  the  Prophet  of  Jupiter,  the  Pythia  was 
the  Prophetess  of  Apollo,  and  the  attendants  or  ex¬ 
pounders  of  her  ejaculations  were  the  Prophets  of  the 
Pythia.  It  is  possible  that  the  Seventy  may .  have 
derived  their  use  of  the  word  from  its  special  applica¬ 
tion  in  Egypt  to  the  chief  of  the  Sacerdotal  order  in 
any  particular  temple.  His  duties  were  to  walk  at 
the  close  of  the  sacred  processions,  bearing  in  his  bo¬ 
som  an  urn  of  sacred  water ;  to  control  the  taxes,  and 
to  teach  the  sacred  books.  It  was  probably  in  this 

1  See  Gesenius,  in  voce  Nabi.  ix.  11,  and  the  connection  of  uccvth. 

Comp.  Prov.  i.  23.  and  / lalvofiac . 

2  1  Sam.  xviii.  10.  Comp.  2  Kings 


Lect.  XIX. 


THE  WORD  “PROPHET.” 


459 


last  capacity  that  the  Greek  name  of  “  Prophet  ”  was 
applied  to  him,  and  that  we  hear  of  the  office  being 
held  by  Sonches  and  Sechnuphis,  the  reputed  masters 
of  Pythagoras  and  of  Plato.1 

The  Greek  proposition  pro  as  compounded  in 
the  word  Pro- phet,  has,  as  is  well  known,  the  three¬ 
fold  meaning  of  “  beforehand,”  “  in  public,”  and  “  in 
behalf  of”  or  “  for.”  It  is  possible  that  all  these  three 
meanings  may  have  a  place  in  the  word.  But  the 
one  which  unquestionably  predominates  in  its  original 
meaning  is  the  third,  —  “  one  who,  speaks  for,”  or  as 
“  the  mouthpiece  of  another  ” 2  As  applied  therefore 
by  the  Septuagint,  in  the  Old  Testament,  and  by  the 
writers  of  the  New  Testament,  who  have  taken  the 
word  from  the  Septuagint,  it  is  used  simply  to  ex¬ 
press  the  same  idea  as  that  intended  in  the  Hebrew 
Nabi :  not  foreteller ,  nor  (as  has  been  said  more  truly, 
but  not  with  absolute  exactness),  “ forth-teller”  but 
“  spokesman,” 3  and  (in  the  religious  sense  in  which 
it  is  almost  invariably  used)  “  expounder,”  and  u  in¬ 
terpreter  ”  of  the  Divine  Mind. 

The  English  words  “  prophet,”  “  prophecy,”  u  prophe¬ 
sying,”  originally  kept  tolerably  close  to  the  Modern 
Biblical  use  of  the  word.  The  celebrated  dis-  word, 
pute  about  “  prophesyings,”  in  the  sense  of  “  preach¬ 
ings,”  in  the  reign  of  Elizabeth,  and  the  treatise  of 
Jeremy  Taylor  on  The  Liberty  of  Prophesying ,  i.  e.,  the 
liberty  of  preaching,  show  that  even  down  to  the 
seventeenth  century,  the  word  was  still  used,  as  in 
the  Bible,  for  “  preaching,”  or  “  speaking  according  to 

1  Clem.  Alex.  Strom,  i.  15,  vi.  4,  nonymously  with  it  (see  Liddell  and 
and  Valesius’  notes  on  Eusebius,  H.  Scott  in  voce). 

E.  iv.  8.  3  Thus  in  Exod.  iv.  16,  vii.  1. 

2  This  appears  clearly  from  the  “  Aaron  shall  be  thy  prophet,”  —  “  in- 
Words  npopavng  and  vttoQtjttjc  used  sy-  stead  of  a  mouth.” 


460  HISTORY  OF  THE  PROPHETICAL  ORDER.  Lect.  XIX. 


the  will  of  God  .”  In  the  seventeenth  century,  however, 
the  limitation  of  the  word  to  the  sense  of  “predic¬ 
tion,”  had  gradually  begun  to  appear ; 1  founded  partly 
on  a  misapprehension  of  the  true  meaning  of  the 
Greek  preposition,  partly  on  the  attention  attracted 
by  the  undoubtedly  predictive  parts  of  the  prophetical 
writings. 

This  secondary  meaning  of  the  word  had  by  the 
time  of  Dr.  Johnson  so  entirely  superseded  the  original 
Scriptural  signification,  that  he  gives  no  other  special 
definition  of  it  than  “  to  predict,  to  foretell,  to  prognos¬ 
ticate  ; ”  “a  predicter,  a  foreteller ; ”  “ foreseeing  or 
foretelling  future  events;”  and  in  this  sense  it  has 
been  used  almost  down  to  our  own  day,  when  the 
revival  of  Biblical  criticism  has  resuscitated,  in  some 
measure,  the  Biblical  use  of  the  word. 

A  somewhat  similar  divergence  of  sentiment  has 
sprung  up  in  the  Mussulman  world.  The  Sonnites  or 
orthodox  Mussulmans  still  use  the  word  in  its  origi¬ 
nal  sense  as  a  divinely  instructed  teacher,  whilst  the 
Shiahs  or  heretical  Mussulmans  use  it  as  equivalent 
to  one  who  has  the  power  of  prediction.  It  is  even 
said  that  this  difference  as  to  the  meaning  of  the 
Prophetic  office,  far  more  than  the  dispute  respecting 
the  succession  to  the  Caliphate,  lies  at  the  root  of 
that  great  schism  in  the  Mussulman  community. 

How  far  the  modern  limitation  of  the  word  is  borne 
out  by  the  unquestionable  prevalence  of  Prediction  in 


1  It  is  true  that  Clement  of  Alex¬ 
andria  occasionally  dwells  on  the  word 
(Strom,  ii:  12)  as  equivalent  to  npo- 
&eom&iv  and  TTpoyivGxmetv,  whence  it 
would  seem  that  he  took  the  preposi¬ 
tion  as  signifying  beforehand.  But 
there  is  hardly  any  appearance  of  this 


usage  either  in  the  LXX.  or  the  New 
Testament.  The  nearest  approaches 
in  the  Biblical  use  of  the  word 
“  Prophet”  to  the  sense  of  prediction 
are  in  the  speeches  and  Epistles  of 
St.  Peter.  (Acts  ii.  30;  iii.  18,  21  ; 
1  Pet.  i.  10;  2  Pet.  i.  19,  20 ;  iii.  2.) 


Lect.  XIX. 


THE  OFFICE. 


461 


the  Prophetical  Office  of  the  Jewish  Church,  will  best 
appear  in  the  next  Lecture.  Meanwhile,  it  is  impor¬ 
tant  at  the  outset,  and  in  the  history  of  the  Order,  to 
adhere  to  the  ancient  and  only  Biblical  use  of  the 
term:  the  more  so,  as  the  contracted  sense  in  which 
it  is  now  popularly  employed  would  exclude  from  our 
consideration  the  most  remarkable  and  characteristic 
instances  of  it, —  Moses,  Samuel,  and  Elijah,  in  the 
Old  Testament  5  John  the  Baptist  and  S.  Paul  in  the 
New. 

The  Prophet  then  was  “the  messenger  or  interpre¬ 
ter  of  the  Divine  will.”  Such  is  the  force  of  all  the 
synonymes  employed  for  the  office.  The  Prophet  is 
expressly  called  “  the  interpreter,” 1  and  “  the  messen¬ 
ger  of  Jehovah.”2  He  is  also  called  “the  man  of 
spirit,”3  and  “the  Spirit  of  Jehovah”  enters  into  him,4 
“clothes”5  him  (thus  corresponding  almost  exactly  to 
our  word  “  inspired.”)  The  greater  Prophets  are  called 
“  men  of  God.” 6  His  communication  is  called  “  the 
word  of  Jehovah,”  and  a  peculiar  term  is  used  for  the 
Divine  voice  in  this  connection,  chiefly  in  Ezekiel  and 
Jeremiah.7  In  the  New  Testament  this  meaning  is 
still  continued.  The  detailed  descriptions  of  “  prophe¬ 
sying,”  by  S.  Paul8  are  hardly  distinguishable  from 
what  we  should  call  “  preaching-;  ”  the  word  “  exhor¬ 
tation,”  or  “consolation,”9  is  used  as  identical  with  it; 


1  Isa.  xliii.  27.  Translated  “  teach¬ 
ers.” 

2  Haggai  i.  1 3  ;  Mai.  i.  1  (the  word 
“Malachi”);  Judg.  ii.  1. 

3  Hos.  ix.  7. 

4  Ezek.  ii.  2. 

5  Judg.  vi.  34;  1  Chron.  xii.  18; 

2  Chron.  xxiv.  20. 


6  Comp.  1  Sam.  ii.  27;  ix.  6 ;  1 
Kings  xii.  22;  xiii.  1,  2. 

7  DM3  See  Gesenius,  in  voce. 

8  1  Cor.  xiv.  3,  4,  24,  25. 

9  Bar -nabas  (“  the  son  of  prophesy¬ 
ing”)  is  expressly  translated  vtoc  ira- 
pa&rjoeug,  “  the  son  of  exhortation,”  or 
as  in  our  version,  “  consolation.”  Acts 
iv.  36.  Comp.  1  Cor.  xiv.  3. 


462  HISTORY  OF  THE  PROPHETICAL  ORDER.  Lect.  XIX. 


and  the  same  stress  as  in  the  Old  Testament  is  laid 
on  the  force  of  the  Divine  impulse,  whence  it  sprung. 
“  Prophecy  came  not  in  old  time  by  the  will  of  man ; 
“  hut  holy  men  of  old  spake  as  they  were  moved  by 
“  the  Holy  Ghost” 1  “  God  spake  by  (or  u  in  ”) 

a  the  Prophets ;  ” 2  whence  the  phrase  in  the  Nicene 
“  Creed,  The  Holy  Spirit  .  .  .  spoke  by  the  Proph- 
«  ets  ” 

Two  points  thus  distinguish  the  Prophets  from  first 
to  last.  The  first  is  their  consciousness  of  deriving 
their  gift  from  a  Divine  source.  No  other  literature 
so  directly  appeals  to  such  an  origin.  The  impulse 
was  irresistible.3  “  Woe  is  me  if  I  preach  not  the 
“  gospel.” 4  Secondly,  the  Divine  communication  is 
made  through  the  persons  of  men.  The  rustling 
leaves  of  Dodona,  or  the  symptoms  of  the  entrails  in 
Roman  sacrifices,  were  thought  u  oracular,”  or  “  pre¬ 
dictive,”  but  would  never  have  been  called  “  pro¬ 
phetic.”  The  “  Urim  and  Thummim  ”  on  the  High 
Priest’s  breastplate  might  be  the  medium  of  a  Divine 
Revelation,  but  whatever  intimations  they  conveyed 
were  not  made  through  the  mind  and  mouth  of  a 
man,  and  were  therefore  not  “  prophecies.” 5 

II.  Such  being  the  meaning  of  the  word,  I  proceed 


1  2  Pet.  i.  21. 

2  Heb.  i.  1. 

3  Num.  xxiv.  1. 

4  1  Cor.  ix.  16. 

5  Two  or  three  other  phrases  in 

connection  with  the  office  must 
be  briefly  noticed  :  1.  The  word 

nataph  rendered  “  prophesy  ” 

and  “  prophet,”  in  Micah  ii.  6,  11,  has 
the  force  of  dropping,  as  gum  from 
a  tree,  and  thus  falls  in  with  the 
original  signification  of  Nabi.  2.  The 
ancient  word  for  “prophet,”  super¬ 


seded  by  Nabi  shortly  after  Samuel’s 
time  is  “  Seer”  ( Roeb ),  1  Sam.  ix. ; 
1  Chron.  ix.  22 ;  xxvi.  28 ;  xxix. 
29.  3.  Another  antique  title  was 

“  Gazer”  ( Hozeh ),  1  Chron.  xxv. 
5  ;  xxi.  9  ;  xxix.  29 ;  2  Chron. 
xxxiii.  19;  Hab.  i.  1;  Isa.  i.  1;  ii. 
1 ;  xiii.  1 ;  Amos.  i.  1.  The  last  trace 
of  the  seer  is  in  “  Hanani  the  seer  ” 
in  the  reign  of  Asa,  2  Chron.  xvi.  7  ; 
the  last  of  the  gazer  in  the  reign  of 
Manasseh,  2  Chron.  xxxiii.  19. 


Lect.  XIX. 


THE  HEATHEN  PROPHETS. 


463 


to  give  a  brief  history  of  the  Institution  in  the  Jew¬ 
ish  Church.  The  life  and  character  of  each  individual 
prophet  will  belong  to  the  period  in  which  he  ap¬ 
peared.  But  a  general  survey  of  all  is  necessary  to 
a  just  understanding  of  each. 

Strictly  speaking,  the  name  and  office  of  a  Prophet 
was  not  confined  to  the  Jewish  people.  Not  to  speak 
of  the  origin  of  the  name  as.  derived  from  Greek  and 
Egyptian  heathenism,  the  Bible  itself  recognizes  the 
existence  of  “  Prophets  ”  outside  the  pale  of  the  true 
religion.  The  earliest  and  greatest  instance  The 
of  a  heathen  Prophet  is  Balaam ; 1  and  the  Prophets, 
form  as  well  as  the  substance  of  his  prophecies  is 
cast  in  the  same  mould  as  that  of  the  Hebrew  proph¬ 
ets  themselves.  The  a  prophets  of  Baal  ”  are  also  fre¬ 
quently  mentioned  during  the  history  of  the  monarchy, 
and  “  false  prophets” 2  are  described  as  abounding.  S. 
Paul  also  recognizes  Epimenides  the  Cretan  as  a 
66  prophet ;  ” 3  perhaps  merely  as  an  equivalent  to 
a  poet,”  or  votes ,  but  probably  in  allusion  to  the  mys¬ 
terious  and  religious  character  with  which  Epimenides 
was  invested.  S.  Jude  also  speaks  of  the  apocryphal 
book  of  Enoch  as  a  prophecy.4  These  instances  are 
important,  both  as  illustrating  the  meaning  of  the 
word  and  the  nature  of  the  office,  and  also  showing 
the  freedom  with  which  the  Bible  recognizes  “  revela¬ 
tion  ”  and  “  inspiration  ”  outside  the  circle  of  the 
Chosen  People.  Still  it  is  within  that  circle,  and  as 
a  special  characteristic  of  the  Jewish  Church  and  na¬ 
tion,  that  the  office  must  be  considered. 

(1.)  There  is  no  direct  mention  of  a  Pixrphet  be- 

1  See  Lecture  VIII.  21),  Ahab  (Ibid.),  Shemaiah  (Ibid. 

2  The  names  of  some  of  these  have  24),  Zedekiah  (1  Kings  xxii.  11,  24.) 
been  preserved.  Hananiah(Jer.xxviii.  3  lit.  i.  12. 

1,17;  LXX.),  Zedekiah  (Jer.  xxix.  4  Yerse  14. 


464  HISTORY  OF  THE  PROPHETICAL  ORDER.  Lect.  XIX 


fore  the  time  of  Moses.  The  name  is  indeed  inciden- 
Tke  rise  tally  given  to  Abraham  when  Abimelech  is 
Prophetic  warned  to  restore  Sarah,  “  for  he  is  a  prophet, 
Order.  a  an(j  he  ghall  pray  for  thee ;  ” 1  and  probably 

the  Psalmist  makes  the  same  allusion  in  the  expres¬ 
sion,  “Do  my  prophets  no  harm”2  But  Abraham 
never  utters  what  would  be  called  “  prophecies ;  ”  and 
those  promises  and  predictions  which  are  made  to  him, 
or  which  occur  in  the  earlier  chapters  of  Genesis,  in 
the  primeval  narrative  of  the  Fall,  though  often  classed 
by  modern  divines  as  “  the  first  prophecies,”  are  never 
so  called  in  the  Bible,  which,  as  we  have  seen,  only 
recognizes  under  the  name  of  “  prophecies  ”  those 
which  are  delivered  through  the  personal  agency  of 
men.  A  nearer  approach  is  in  the  Blessing  of  Jacob.3 
This,  however,  is  never  directly  called  a  prophecy  in 
the  Bible,  nor  is  Jacob  called  a  Prophet. 

But  Moses  receives  the  name  repeatedly,  and  in 
one  famous  passage 4  is  made  the  type  or  like¬ 
ness  of  the  whole  order,  even  of  the  Last  and 
Greatest  of  all.  The  exposition  of  the  Law  is  what 
most  peculiarly  marks  his  position.  The  poetical  gift 
displayed  in  the  three  Songs  of  the  Pentateuch,5  and 
the  90th  Psalm,  belongs  to  him  in  common  with  the 
Prophets  of  a  later  time.6  Such  a  burst  of  prophecy, 
as  is  contained  in  the  acts  and  words  of  Moses,  of  itself 
marks  his  appearance  as  the  first  Prophetical  epoch 
in  the  Jewish  Church,  and,  as  might  be  expected,  in¬ 
dications  of  its  lesser  manifestations  elsewhere  at  this 
time  are  faintly  discerned.  Aaron  is  described  as  “  a 
“prophet”  in  relation  to  Moses  himself.7  Miriam  is 


Under 

Moses. 


1  Gen.  xx.  7. 
3  Gen.  xlix. 


2  Ps.  cv.  15. 

4  Deut.  xviii.  15-18.  See  Lecture 


5  Ex.  xv.  1-19;  Deut.  xxxii.  xxxiii.  VII. 


7  Ex.  iv.  16  ;  vii.  1. 


6  Lecture  VHI. 


Lect.  XIX. 


UNDER  SAMUEL. 


465 


almost  always  designated  as  ec  the  prophetess/’  and  on 
one  occasion  not  only  the  seventy  elders,  but  two 
youths  outside  the  sacred  circle,  are  described  as 
catching  the  Divine  afflatus ;  and  the  great  Prophet, 
in  despite  of  the  narrower  spirit  of  the  soldier  Joshua, 
wishes  that  it  should  extend  to  the  whole  people.1 

(2.)  With  the  generation  of  Moses  the  gift  seems 
for  a  time  to  have  expired.  Joshua  has  some-  Underthe 
times  been  reckoned  as  a  Prophet,  and  his  Judges' 
address  to  the  people  before  his  death  may,  in  the 
Hebrew  sense  of  the  word,  perhaps  be  regarded  as  a 
prophecy.  But  this  is  not  a  usual  view  of  his  posi¬ 
tion.  Josephus  thinks  that  he  was  accompanied  by  a 
Prophet.  And  on  one  occasion,  just  before  his  death, 
a  “  messenger  of  the  Lord,”  an  earlier  “  Malachi,”  is 
described  as  addressing  the  people  at  Bochim.2  Two 
more  such  nameless  Prophets  appear  in  the  days  of 
Gideon  and  of  Eli.3  Ehud  apparently  had  that  character 
at  the  court  of  Moab.4  But  these  are  doubtful  and 
isolated  instances.  The  only  detailed  and  character¬ 
istic  prophecy  of  the  time  of  the  Judges,  is  that  of 
“  the  Prophetess  ”  Deborah.5  The  other  Judges,  if 
Prophets  at  all,  are  Prophets  only  in  action.  They 
were  a  clothed  with  the  Divine  Spirit,”  or  “  struck  ”  6  by 
it,  but  only  to  perform  acts  of  strength,  not  to  utter 
words  of  wisdom. 

It  is  at  the  close  of  the  period  of  the  Judges  that 
the  office  of  Prophet  first  becomes  not  merely  an  oc¬ 
casional  manifestation,  but  a  fixed  institution  in  the 
Jewish  Church.  Samuel  is  the  true  founder  Under 
of  the  Order  of  Prophets.  u  Until  Samuel  the  SamueL 

1  Num.  xi.  25-29. 

2  Judg.  ii.  1. 

3  Ibid.  vi.  8  ;  1  Sam.  ii.  27. 

59 


4  Judg.  iii.  20. 

5  Ibid*  iv.  4  ;  v.  7. 

6  See  Lecture  XII. 


466 


HISTORY  OF  THE  PROPHETICAL  OFFICE.  Lect.  XIX. 


“  prophet/’  “  From  Samuel  and  those  that  follow 
“  after.” 1  “  Samuel  and  the  Prophets,” 2  are  expres¬ 
sions  which  exactly  agree  with  the  facts  of  the  his¬ 
tory.  In  his  time  the  name  of  “  Prophet,”  ( Nabi )  first 
came  into  use,  in  place  of  the  ancient  and  less  ex¬ 
alted  title  of  “ Seer” 3  ( Roeh ),  or  “Gazer”  ( Hozeh ).  In 
his  time  first  appear  the  companies  of  “  the  sons  of 
the  prophets.”4  From  his  time  the  succession  con¬ 
tinues,  in  every  generation,  unbroken  down  to  Mala- 
chi.  He,  like  Moses,  appears  not  alone,  but  as  the 
centre  of  a  circle  of  Prophets ;  but,  unlike  Moses,  of 
a  circle  some  of  whom  were  as  highly  endowed  with 
prophetic  gifts  as  he  himself.  Without  dwelling  on 
the  doubtful  case  of  his  father  Elkanah  and  his 
mother  Hannah,  there  were  certainly  Gad,  Nathan, 
David,  Saul,  and  Heman,  Samuel’s  grandson,  amongst 
those  who,  if  they  were  not  actually  educated  by  him, 
all  marked  the  epoch  of  his  appearance.  Amongst 
these,  Samuel,  Gad,  and  Heman,  as  if  still  belonging 
in  a  measure  to  the  older  state  of  things,  are  called 
“  Seers,”  whereas  Nathan  and  David  bear,  without 
variation,  the  new  name  of  “  Prophet.” 5 

(3.)  From  the  two  most  remarkable  of  this  age, 

David  and  Nathan  anc^  David,  flowed  in  all  probability, 
Nathan.  the  two  prophetic  schools,  which  never  en¬ 
tirely  ceased  out  of  the  Jewish  Church  as  long  as 
the  prophetic  gift  lasted  at  all,  but  which  may  be  no¬ 
ticed  especially  on  this  their  first  appearance.  David, 
in  continental  nations  is  always  termed  not  “  the 
“  Royal  Psalmist,”  but  “  the  Prophet  King,”  and  in 

1  Acts  iii.  24;  xiii.  20.  28;  xxix.  29,  “the  seer”  ( Roeh )  ; 

2  Heb.  xi.  32.  Gad,  1  Chron.  xxix.  29  ;  xxi.  9 ;  He- 

3  1  Sam.  ix.  9.  man,  1  Chron.  xxv.  5;  “the  gazer” 

*  See  Lecture  XVIII.  ( Hozeh )  ;  Nathan  “  the  prophet  ” 

5  Samuel,  1  Chron.  ix.  22;  xxvi.  (Nabi),  1  Chron.  xxix.  29. 


Lect.  XIX. 


UNDER  THE  MONARCHY. 


467 


Mussulman  traditions  is  especially  known  as  “  the 
“  Prophet  of  God/’  as  Abraham  is  the  “  Friend/’  and 
Mahomet  “  the  Apostle  ”  of  God.  He  gave  to  his 
prophetic  utterances  the  peculiar  charm  of  song  and 
music,  which  has  procured  him  amongst  ourselves  the 
name  of  “  the  Psalmist/’  and  to  his  prophecies  and 
those  that  are  formed  on  their  model,  the  name  of 
“  Psalms,”  or  “  songs.”  Nathan  (who  probably  is  the 
first  “  seer  ”  that  received  distinctly  the  name  of 
“  Prophet”),  in  one  of  the  only  two  prophecies  di¬ 
rectly  ascribed  to  him,  gives  it  the  form  of  an  apo¬ 
logue  or  proverb,  that  of  the  ewe-lamb ;  and  being  as 
he  was  the  main  supporter,  if  not  instructor/  of  Solo¬ 
mon,  may  be  considered  as  the  first  example  of  that 
kind  of  moral  instruction  in  which  the  gifts  of  Solo¬ 
mon,  though  not  expressly  called  prophetic,  found 
their  chief  vent. 

(4.)  It  was  in  the  disorders  at  the  close  of  Solo¬ 
mon’s  reign  that  the  Prophetic  Order  as-  in  the 
sumed  an  importance  in  the  state  such  as  it  Kingdom, 
had  never  acquired  before.  Samuel  had  transferred 
the  crown  from  Saul  to  David ;  Nathan  from  Adonijah 
to  Solomon.  But  Ahijah,  in  transferring  it  from  Re- 
hoboam  to  Jeroboam,  created  not  merely  a  new 
dynasty,  but  a  new  kingdom.  The  northern  king¬ 
dom  was,  during  the  first  period  of  its  existence,  the 
kingdom  of  the  Prophets.  The  Priests  took  refuge  in 
Judah.  But  the  Prophets,  for  the  first  two  centuries 
after  the  disruption,  were  almost  entirely  confined  to 
Israel.  All  the  seats  of  prophetic  instruction  (with 
the  possible  exception  of  Ramah)  were  within  the 
kingdom  of  Samaria,  —  Bethel,  Jericho,  Gilgal,  Car¬ 
mel. 


1  2  Sam.  xii.  25.  (LXX.)  ;  1  Kings  i.  10. 


468 


HISTORY  OF  THE  PROPHETICAL  ORDER.  Lect.  XIX 


We  hear  of  these  by  fifties,  and  by  hundreds  at 
once,1  and  amongst  these  the  names  of  many  have 
come  down  to  us:  Ahijah  of  Shiloh,2  Iddo  “the  seer,”3 
Jehu  the  son  of  Hanani,4  Obadiah,5  Micaiah,6  Oded,7 
and,  chiefest  of  all,  Elijah  and  Elisha.  A  few  Proph¬ 
ets  of  the  southern  kingdom  are  mentioned  as  con¬ 
temporary  with  these :  Azariah,8  Hanani,9  “  the  seer,” 
Eliezer.10  But  neither  in  numbers  nor  in  influence  can 


these  be  compared  with  those  who  had  their  sphere 
of  action  in  the  north,  of  whom  Elijah  stands  forth 
as  the  great  representative.  In  this  arduous  position, 
sometimes  at  variance,  sometimes  in  close  harmony, 
with  the  Kings  of  Israel,  they  maintained  the  true 
religion  in  the  northern  tribes,  at  times  when  in 
Judah  it  was  crushed  to  the  ground,  and  when  in 
Israel  it  had  to  struggle  against  severe  persecution  or 
sluggish  apathy.  And  by  their  free  passage  to  and 
fro  between  the  rival  kingdoms,  and  their  endeavors 
on  both  sides  to  keep  up  a  sentiment  of  humanity,11 
the  Prophets  of  this  epoch  must  be  regarded  as  im¬ 
portant  instruments  for  upholding  not  only  the  relig¬ 
ious  but  the  national  unity. 

(5.)  This  is  the  great  epoch  of  the  Prophetic  action 
as  distinct  from  the  Prophetic  writings  of  the  In  the 
Jewish  Church.  It  is  true  that  during  this  Jj^ah, 
time  the  main  historical  literature  of  the as  wnters- 
country  was  formed  under  the  prophetic  guidance. 
We  have  distinct  notices  of  the  works  in  which  Sam- 


1  1  Kings  xviii.  4 ;  2  Kings  ii.  3. 

3  2  Chron.  ix.  29.  Identified  by- 

Josephus  and  Jerome  with  the  proph¬ 

et  of  Judah,  1  Kings  xiii.  1. 

5  1  Kings  xviii.  3  :  and  2  Kings  iv. 

1,  according  to  Josephus  (Ant.  ix.  4, 
§  2). 

7  2  Chron.  xxviii.  9. 


2  1  Kings  xi.  29. 

4  1  Kings  xvi.  7. 

6  1  Kings  xxii.  3. 

8  2  Chron.  xv.  1-8. 

9  Ibid.  xvi.  7. 

1°  Ibid.  xx.  37. 

11  Ibid,  xxviii.  9-  See  Lecture 
XX. 


Lect.  XIX. 


UNDER  THE  MONARCHY. 


469 


uel,  Gad,  and  Nathan  described  the  life  of  David,1 
and  in  which  Nathan  and  Iddo  described  the  lives  of 
Solomon  and  Jeroboam.2  These  unfortunately  have 
all  perished.  Their  historical  as  well  as  their  poeti¬ 
cal  writings,  no  less  than  those  of  the  still  earlier 
period  of  Moses  and  the  Judges,  are  handed  down  in 
the  compositions  or  compilations  of  others.  The  writ¬ 
ings  of  David  alone  have  been  preserved  in  an  inde¬ 
pendent  and  original  form.  But  about  the  time  of  th 
destruction  of  the  northern  kingdom,  a  new  phase 
passed  over  the  Prophetic  Order.  Probably  in  con¬ 
sequence  of  the  increasing  cultivation  of  the  people 
that  had  set  in  during  the  reign  of  Solomon,  and 
had  gradually  penetrated  all  classes,  the  Prophets,  or 
their  immediate  disciples,  seem  to  have  committed  to 
writing  the  greater  part  of  their  prophecies. 

Of  these  written  prophecies,  the  earliest  is  probably 
that  of  Joel ;  and  in  him  the  man  of  action  is  still 
visible  athwart  the  written  record.  Close  following 
upon  him,  are  the  last  Prophets  of  the  declining  king¬ 
dom  of  the  north,  —  Jonah  (whether  as  appearing  in 
the  history  or  in  the  book  of  which  he  is  the  sub¬ 
ject),  Hosea,  and  Amos. 

Immediately  succeeding  to  these,  but  now  confined 
to  the  southern  kingdom,  rises  the  great  school  of 
Prophets,  under  Uzziah  and  his  three  successors,  Isaiah, 
Micah,  Nahum,  and  “  Zechariah,3  who  had  understand¬ 
ing  in  the  visions  of  God.”  Following  upon  these, 
in  fainter  strains,  as  the  external  dangers  increased, 


1  1  Chron.  xxix.  29. 

2  Ibid. ;  2  Chron.  ix.  29. 

3  2  Chron.  xxvi.  5.  This  is  prob¬ 
ably  the  same  as  Zechariah,  the  son 
of  Jeberechiah  (Isa.  viii.  2),  to  whom 
have  been  often  ascribed,  with  much 


probability,  portions,  if  not  the  whole, 
of  the  prophecies  quoted  by  S.  Mat¬ 
thew  (xxvii.  9, 10)  under  the  name  of 
Jeremiah,  and  now  contained  in  the 
writings  of  the  later  Zechariah  (Zech. 
ix.-xiii.) 


470  HISTORY  OF  THE  PROPHETICAL  ORDER.  Lect.  XIX 


and  the  internal  strength  of  the  kingdom  declined, 
were  Zephaniah,  probably  Habakkuk,  Obadiah,  and  the 
nameless  “seer”  or  “seers”1  in  the  reign  of  Manasseh. 
The  whole  of  this  series  is  concluded  by  the  most 
mournful,  and  in  some  respects  the  greatest  of  the 
older  Prophets,  Jeremiah,  with  the  circle  of  inferior 
Prophets  round  him,  —  Huldah,  the  Prophetess,2  Uri- 
jah,  and  Hanan.3 

(6.)  Jeremiah  is  the  last  of  the  Prophetic  Order  who 

in  the  actively  concerned  in  moving  the  affairs  of 

Captivity.  g|-a£e  anc[  Church.  In  the  Prophets  of 

the  Captivity  and  of  the  Keturn,  the  character  of 
authors  goes  far  to  supersede  the  character  of  their 
older  mission.  Their  works  are  for  the  most  part,  as 
those  of  their  predecessors  had  never  been,  arranged 
in  chronological  sequence,  and  their  style  becomes 
continuous  and  fixed.  Amongst  these,  three  names 
are  conspicuous,  —  Ezekiel,  who  connects  the  close  of 
the  monarchy  with  the  commencement  of  the  Cap¬ 
tivity  ;  the  Evangelical  Prophet,4  who  heralds  the 
return  from  the  Captivity  •  and  Daniel,5  whatever  be 


1  2  Chron.  xxxiii.  19. 

2  2  Kings  xxii.  14. 

3  Jer.  xxvi.  20  ;  xxxv.  4. 

4  By  this  term  may  be  designated 
the  Author  of  Isa.  xl.-lxvi.,  whether, 
with  most  continental  scholars,  he  is 
regarded  as  a  separate  prophet  from 
the  Isaiah  of  Hezekiah,  or,  with  most 
English  divines,  he  is  regarded  as  the 
older  Isaiah,  transported  into  a  style 
and  position  later  than  his  own  time. 

5  The  Jewish  Canon  refuses  to 
acknowledge  the  prophetic  character 
of  this  Book,  and  places  it  in  the 
Hagiographa.  The  title,  as  it  stands 
in  our  own  version,  is  not  the  “  Book 
of  Daniel  the  Prophet,”  but  “  the 


Book  of  Daniel.”  Ecclesiasticus  (xlix. 
9,  10)  omits,  in  like  manner,  all 
mention  of  it.  In  the  quotation  from 
it  in  Mark  xiii.  14,  the  best  MSS. 
omit  all  mention  of  the  name  or  office 
of  the  writer.  In  the  corresponding 
passage  in  Matt.  xxiv.  15,  the  Syriac 
version  omits  the  name  of  the  writer. 
But  still  as  the  word  “  prophet  ”  is  in 
that  text  associated  with  the  book, 
and  as  Daniel  is  so  reckoned  by  the 
Eastern  world  at  the  present  day, 
and  as  the  book  unquestionably  con¬ 
tains  a  special  prophetic  element  of 
the  highest  value  (on  which  I  shall  en¬ 
large  in  my  next  Lecture,)  we  may  sc 
far  follow  the  received  opinion  of  the 


Lect.  XIX. 


EXTINCTION  OF  PROPHECY. 


471 


the  exact  date  or  character  we  assign  to  the  book 
which  bears  his  name.  The  group  following  And  the 
the  Captivity  consists  of  Haggai,  Zechariah,1  Return* 
and  the  unknown  “  messenger/’  whom  we  call  Mala- 
chi.  These  three,  probably,  alone  of  the  books  of  the 
Old  Testament,  stand  in  the  canons  in  the  order  in 
which  they  were  originally  published.  The  only  other 
indications  of  the  prophetic  spirit  in  this  period  are 
amongst  the  Samaritans,  —  “  the  prophetess  Noadiah,” 
and  “  the  rest  of  the  Prophets.” 2  Ezra  is  once  called  a 
Prophet  in  one  of  the  later  books  to  which  his  name 
is  affixed ; 3  but  this  is  not  his  usual  designation. 

(7.)  With  Malachi,  accordingly,  the  succession  which 
had  continued  unbroken  from  the  time  of  Samuel 
terminates,  and  a  host  of  legends,  Jewish  and  Mussul¬ 
man,  commemorate  the  extinction  of  the  prophetic 
gift.  “We  see  not  our  signs:*  there  is  no  more  Extinction 
any  prophet.”4  It  is  true  that  the  Books  of  ecy. 
Baruch,  Wisdom,  and  Ecclesiasticus,  lay  claim,  more 
or  less,  both  to  the  prophetic  form  and  prophetic 
character.  Still  the  impassioned  poetic  flow  of  the 
earlier  Prophets  is  greatly  abated,  and  the  name  is 
rarely  used.  The  Religion  of  the  Old  Dispensation 
was  fully  revealed  and  constituted  —  not  prophets  were 
needed  to  declare  it,  but  “  scribes”  to  expound  and 
defend  it.5 

It  is  this  long  silence  or  deterioration  of  the  gift 
that  renders  its  resuscitation  more  remarkable.  Revival 

at  the  Chris- 

It  was  “in  the  days  of  Herod  the  king,”  that  Ran  era. 
the  voice  of  a  Prophet  was  once  more  heard.  We 

present  day  as  to  rank  him  amongst  2  Neh.  vi.  14. 

the  Prophets,  of  this  or  of  the  sue-  3  2  Esdras  i.  1. 

eeeding  period,  according  to  the  view  4  Ps.  lxxiv.  9. 

taken  of  the  date  of  the  book.  5  This  is  well  brought  out  in  Nico- 

1  See  especially  Zech.  i.-viii.  las’  Doctrines  Religieuses  des  Jui/s,  25 


472 


HISTORY  OF  THE  PROPHETICAL  ORDER.  Lect.  XIX. 


shall  never  understand  the  true  appearance  of  the 
Baptist,  or  of  Him  whose  forerunner  he  was,  nor  the 
continuity  of  the  Old  and  New  Testaments,  unless  we 
bear  in  mind  that  the  period  of  the  Christian  era  was 
the  culminating  point  of  the  Prophetic  ages  of  the 
Jewish  Church.  "  The  word  of  God  came  unto  John 
the  son  of  Zechariah,”  as  it  had  come  before  to  Isaiah 
The  Baptist,  the  son  of  Amoz.  "The  people  counted  him 
as  a  prophet.”  "  He  was  a  prophet,  and  more  than  a 
prophet.” 1  In  appearance,  in  language,  in  character, 
he  was  what  Elijah  had  been  in  the  reign  of  Ahab. 
And  yet  he  was  only  the  messenger  of  a  Prophet 
christ.  greater  than  himself.  The  whole  public  min¬ 
istry  of  our  Lord  was  that  of  a  Prophet.  He  was 
much  more  than  this.  But  it  was  as  a  Prophet  that 
He  acted  and  ‘spoke.  It  was  this  which  gave  Him 
His  hold  on  the  mind  of  the  nation.  He  entered,  as 
it  were  naturally,  on  an  office  vacant,  but  already  ex¬ 
isting.  His  discourses  were  all,  in  the  highest  sense 
of  the  word,  "prophecies.” 

And,  when  He  was  withdrawn  from  the  earth,  He, 
The  like  Moses  and  Samuel,  left  a  circle  of  Prophets 
Apostles,  behind  Him,  through  whom  the  sacred  gift  was 
continued  and  diffused.  It  was  one  of  the  expected 
marks  of  the  Messiah’s  kingdom  that  the  prophetic  in¬ 
spiration  should  become  universal.2  This  expectation 
S.  Peter  saw  realized  on  the  day  of  Pentecost ;  and 
from  S.  Paul’s  allusions,3  it  is  evident  that  the  posses¬ 
sion  of  the  gift  throughout  the  Christian  community 
was  the  rule,  and  not  the  exception.  Some  there  were 
more  eminent  than  others,  whose  names,  sayings,  or 

1  Luke  iii.  2;  Matt.  xi.  9;  xiv.  8.  -  Joel  ii.  28,  29. 

Zacharias  and  Anna  also  indicate  the  3  1  Cor.  xii.  xiv. 

return  of  the  prophetic  gift  (Luke  i. 

67,  ii.  36.). 


Lect.  XIX. 


IN  THE  APOSTOLIC  AGE. 


473 


writings,  have  been  preserved  to  us.  Agabus,  Simeon 
Niger,  Lucius,  Manaen,  Philip's  daughters,1  Joseph,  who 
derived  from  this  gift  the  name  by  which  he  was  usu¬ 
ally  known,  of  “  Barnabas,”  Saul,  who  was  called  Paul,2 
J ohn ; 3  and  to  these  we  may  probably  add,  though  not 
expressly  bearing  the  name,  Cephas  or  Peter,  Jacob  or 
James  the  Younger,  Judas  or  Thaddeus,  and  the  au¬ 
thor  of  the  Epistle  to  the  Hebrews.  With  John,  as 
far  as  we  know,  the  name  and  the  thing  ceased.  There 
have  been  great  men  to  whom  the  title  has  been  given 
in  later  times.  There  have  been  others  who  have 
claimed  it  for  themselves.  But  in  the  peculiar  Bibli¬ 
cal,  Hebrew  sense  of  the  word,  and  certainly  within 
the  circle  of  the  Jewish  Church,  S.  John  was  the  Last 
of  the  Prophets. 

III.  This  rapid  sketch  may  suffice  to  have  given  a 
connected  view  of  the  history  of  the  Order.  The  Insti_ 

I  now  proceed  to  describe  some  of  its  charac- tutlon* 
teristics,  as  an  Institution. 

* 

(1.)  The  first  call,  in  most  instances  of  which  there 
are  records,  seems  to  have  been  through  a  vision  or 
apparition,  resembling  those  which  have  in  Christian 
times  produced  celebrated  conversions,  as  of  the  Cross 
to  Constantine,  and  to  Colonel  Gardiner,  and  of  the 
voice  to  S.  Augustine.  The  word  “Seer,”  by  which 
“  the  prophet  ” 4  was  originally  called,  implies  Prophetic 
that  visions  were  the  original  mode  of  reve-  trough 
lation  to  the  Prophets.  These  visions  in  the  Vlslons; 
case  of  the  Prophets  of  the  Old  Testament  were  al¬ 
most  always  presented  in  images  peculiarly  appropri¬ 
ate  to  the  age  or  the  person  to  wThom  they  appear ; 
and  almost  always  conveying  some  lofty  conception 

1  Acts  xi.  28;  xiii.  1  ;  xxi.  8,  9,  10.  3  Rev.  x.  11 ;  xxii.  7,  9,  10,  18,  19. 

2  Acts  iv.  36 ;  xiii.  2,  7.  4  1  Sam.  ix.  9. 


60 


474  HISTORY  OF  THE  PROPHETICAL  ORDER.  Lect.  XIX 


of  the  Divine  nature.  Such  are  the  vision  of  the 
Burning  Bush  to  Moses,  of  the  Throne  in  the  Temple 
to  Isaiah,  of  the  complicated  chariot-wheels  to  Ezekiel, 
and  (although  not  at  the  commencement  of  his  mis¬ 
sion)  of  the  still  small  voice  to  Elijah.  The  highest 
form  of  vision  in  the  Old  Testament  is  that  mentioned 
in  the  case  of  Moses,  who  is  described  as  something 
even  above  a  Prophet.  “  If  there  be  a  prophet  among 
“  you,  I  the  Lord  will  make  myself  known  unto  him 
“in  a  vision,  and  will  speak  unto  him  in  a  dream. 
“My  servant  Moses  is  not  so,  who  is  faithful  in  all 
“  mine  house.  With  him  will  I  speak  mouth  to  mouth, 
“  even  visibly,  and  not  in  dark  speeches ;  and  the  sim- 
“  ilitude  of  the  Lord  shall  he  behold.”  1 

In  like  manner  to  the  great  Prophets  of  the  New 
Testament,  the  purpose  of  these  Divine  visions  seems 
to  have  been  effected  by  the  intercourse  of  the  Apos¬ 
tles  with  Christ.  “  Have  I  not  seen  Christ  the  Lord  ?  ” 2 
is  S.  Paul’s  account  of  his  own  qualifications,  which 
would  apply  to  all  of  them. 

These  visions  or  communications  are  described  as 
taking  place  sometimes  through  dreams,  as  in  the  case 
of  Samuel,  Nathan,  Elijah  at  Horeb  ;  sometimes  through 
an  ecstatic  trance,  as  in  the  case  of  Balaam,  S.  John, 
and  S.  Peter ;  sometimes  both,  as  in  the  case  of  S. 
Paul.  But  the  more  ordinary  mode  through  which 
“  the  word  of  the  Lord,”  as  far  as  we  can  trace,  came, 

through  was  through  a  Divine  impulse  given  to  the 
theProph-  pr0phet’s  own  thoughts.  This  may  be  seen 
mind.  partly  from  the  absence  of  any  direct  men¬ 
tion  of  an  external  appearance  or  voice,  partly  from 
the  fact  that  the  message  as  delivered  is  expressed  in 
the  peculiar  style  of  the  individual  prophet  who  speaks. 

1  Num.  xii.  6-8.  2  1  Cor.  ix.  1. 


Lect.  XIX. 


ITS  UNIVERSALITY. 


475 


This  close  connection  between  the  Divine  message  and 
the  personal  thoughts  and  affections  of  the  Prophet 
is  still  more  apparent  in  the  New  Testament  than  in 
the  Old,  and  reaches  its  highest  point  in  the  utterances 
of  the  Greatest  of  all  the  Prophets,  Christ  Himself. 
In  Him  the  Divine  is  so  closely  united  with  the  hu¬ 
man,  that  the  passage  from  the  one  to  the  other  is 
imperceptible.  He  is  Himself  66  the  Word”  In  three 
cases  only,  but  then  for  special  purposes,1  is  there  any 
indication  of  a  communication  external  to  himself.  “  He 
“  speaks  that  which  He  knows,  and  testifies  that  which 
“  He  has  seen.” 

(2.)  In  accordance  with  this  intimate  relation  be¬ 
tween  the  Prophets  and  their  Divine  call,  is  Absence  of 

consecra- 

the  fact  that  of  all  the  offices  of  the  Jewish  tion. 
Church  and  State,  this  alone  appears  to  be  the  direct 
result  of  the  call,  without  any  outward  or  formal  con¬ 
secration.  Kings  and  Priests,  in  the  Old  Testament, 
are  anointed;  bishops  (or  presbyters)  and  deacons  in 
the  New  Testament,  have  an  imposition  of  hands. 
But  there  is  no  instance  (or  but  one2)  of  the  anoint¬ 
ing  of  a  Prophet  in  the  Old  Testament,  or  of  the 
consecration,  by  laying  on  hands,  of  a  Prophet  or 
Apostle  in  the  New  Testament.  It  was  a  “  call,”  cor¬ 
responding  to  the  call  of  natural  gifts,  or  inward  move¬ 
ments  of  the  Divine  Spirit  through  the  conscience,  in 
our  own  times. 

(3.)  The  Prophetic  office,  thus  dependent  entirely 
on  the  personal  relation  of  the  Prophet  to  his  Univer_ 
Divine  Instructor,  was,  unlike  any  of  the  other  8ahty* 
sacred  offices  of  the  ancient  world,  confined  to  no  one 
circle  or  caste  of  men.  Its  universality  is  everywhere 
part  of  its  essence.  Although  a  few,  such  as  Jeremiah, 

1  Matt.  iii.  1 7  ;  xvii.  5 ;  John  xii.  28.  anoint  Elisha.”  But  there  is  no  rec- 


476  HISTORY  OF  THE  PROPHETICAL  ORDER.  Lect.  XIX 

Ezekiel,  and  John  the  Baptist,  were  priests,  although 
Moses  and  Samuel  belonged  to  the  tribe  of  Levi,  yet 
there  was  nothing  sacerdotal  even  in  these;  in  this 
respect  forming  a  remarkable  contrast  to  the  Egyp¬ 
tian  “  Prophets,”  as  described  by  Clement  of  Alexan¬ 
dria.  Most  of  them  belonged  to  other  tribes ;  the 
Greatest  of  all  was  of  the  tribe  of  Judah.  They  came 
from  every  station  of  life.  Moses,  Deborah,  and  Sam¬ 
uel  were  warriors  and  leaders  of  the  people ;  David 
and  Saul  were  kings ;  Amos  was  a  herdsman ;  Elijah 
a  Bedouin  wanderer.  Women  as  well  as  men  were 
seized  by  the  gift,  —  Miriam,  Deborah,  Huldah,  Anna, 
the  four  danghters  of  Philip.  This  universal  diffusion 
of  the  gift  answered  the  double  purpose  of  keeping 
the  minds  of  the  people  alive  to  the  constant  expec¬ 
tation  of  some  new  Prophet  appearing  in  the  most 
secluded  or  unwonted  situation;1  and  also  of  main¬ 
taining  a  constant  protest  against  the  rigidity  of  caste 
and  ceremonial  institution,  into  which  all  religion, 
especially  all  Eastern  religion,  is  likely  to  fall.  To  a 
certain  degree  the  institution  of  the  Christian  clergy 
fulfils  the  same  end,  as  being  open  to  all  comers  from 
whatever  rank.  But  even  here  the  effect  is  less  strik¬ 
ing  than  in  the  case  of  the  Jewish  Prophet;  partly, 
because  in  some  branches  of  Christendom,  as  in  the 
Bussian  Church,  the  clergy  have  virtually  become  an 
hereditary  caste,  partly  because  in  modern  times  they 
have  practically  been  drawn  from  one  stratum  of  so¬ 
ciety,  and  have  been  animated  by  a  professional  feel¬ 
ing,  such  as  must  have  been  impossible  in  the  Jewish 
Prophets,  who  included  within  their  number  functions 
so  different  as  those  of  king  and  peasant,  characters 
so  different  as  Saul  and  Isaiah. 

(4.)  But  although  the  office  was  characterized  by 

1  See  Lecture  VII. 


Lect.  XIX. 


SCHOOLS  OF  THE  PROPHETS. 


477 


this  universal  spirit,  the  Prophets  still  constituted  a 
separate  order  in  the  state  which,  at  least  during  the 
time  of  the  monarchy,  can  be  reproduced  in  some  de¬ 
tail,  and  compared  to  like  institutions  elsewhere.  From 
Samuel’s  time  they  appear  to  have  been  formed  into 
separate  companies,  to  which  modern  divines  have 
given  the  name  of  “  schools  of  the  prophets.” 1  Schools  of 
These  companies  are  described  by  a  word  sig-  ets. 
nifying  “  chain  ”  or  “  cord.”  They  were  called  6C  sons 
cc  of  the  prophets ;  ”  and  their  chief  for  the  time  being 
was  (like  the  “  abbott  ”  of  a  monastery)  called  “  fa¬ 
ther.”2  Music  and  song  were  among  the  instruments 
of  their  education.3  They  were  congregated  chiefly  at 
Eamah  (during  Samuel’s  life),  and  afterwards  at  Bethel, 
Gilgal,  Jericho,  and  finally  Jerusalem.  At  Jerusalem 
many  of  them  lived  in  chambers  attached  to  the  court 
of  the  Temple.4  They  wore  a  simple  dress  —  perhaps, 
since  Elijah  introduced  it,  a  sheepskin  cloak.5  In 
Samuel’s  time  (according  to  Josephus6)  long  hair  and 
abstinence  from  wine  were  regarded  as  signs  of  a 
Prophet.  They  had  their  food  in  common.7  They 
lived  in  huts  made  of  the  branches  of  trees.8  In  one 
such,  probably,  John  lived  in  the  same  neighborhood. 
They  were  to  be  found  in  considerable  numbers,  — 
fifty,9  or  even  four  hundred  at  a  time.10  Not  to  have 


1  The  word  “  schools”  nowhere  oc¬ 
curs  in  the  Authorized  Version,  nor 
has  it  any  corresponding  term  in  the 
original.  “  Sons  of  the  prophets  ”  is 
the  nearest  approach  to  a  collective 
name,  as  in  2  Kings  ii.  3  ;  iv.  1 , 38, 43. 
The  fullest  account  of  them  is  in  1 
Chron.  xxv.  To  these  passages  should 
probably  be  added  Eccles.  xii.  8-11. 
There  is  an  ingenious  description  of 
them  in  Cowley’s  Davideis. 


2  2  Kings  ii.  12. 

3  1  Sam.  x.  5. 

4  Jer.  xxxv.  4. 

5  Zech.  xiii.  4. 

6  Ant.  v.  10,  §  3. 

7  2  Kings  iv.  40. 

8  Ibid.  vi.  1-5. 

9  Ibid.  ii.  16. 

10  1  Kings  xxii.  6. 


478  HISTORY  OF  THE  PROPHETICAL  ORDER.  Lect.  XIX. 

been  brought  up  in  these  schools  was  deemed  an  ex¬ 
ceptional  case.1  Some,  like  Isaiah  in  Jerusalem,  or 
Elisha  in  Samaria,  lived  in  great  towms,  in  houses  of 
their  own.  The  higher  Prophets  had  inferior  Prophets 
or  servants  attendant  upon  them,  whose  duty  it  was 
to  pour  water  on  their  hands,  and  secure  provisions 
for  them.2  Thus  Moses  had  Joshua  and  others ;  Elijah 
had  Elisha;  Elisha  had  Gehazi.  Many  of  them  were 
married,  and  had  families ;  for  example,  Moses,  Miriam, 
Deborah,  Samuel,  David,  Nathan,  Ahijah,  Hosea,  Isaiah, 
Ezekiel.  The  wife  was  sometimes,  as  in  the  case  of 
the  wife  of  Isaiah,  called  “  the  Prophetess.” 3  This  con¬ 
tinued  to  the  prophetical  office  in  the  New  Testament, 
when  all  the  greater  Prophets  claimed,  and  most  of 
them  enjoyed,  the  privilege  of  married  life, —  Zacharias, 
Anna,  and  all  of  the  Apostles,  it  is  said,  except  Paul 
and  John.4  To  this  manner  of  life  several  parallels 
suggest  themselves  in  later  times.  The  rule  of  inmates 
of  colleges  and  of  monasteries  in  some  points  resem¬ 
bles,  and  has  perhaps  imitated,  the  outward  forms  of 
the  prophetic  schools.  But  the  Christian  and  Western 
notions  of  celibacy  have  made  a  material  difference  ; 
and,  on  the  whole,  the  nearest  approach  is  that  of 
dervishes  in  the  East,  —  in  their  wandering  life,  in 
their  symbolical  actions,  in  their  scanty  dress,  in  their 
succession  of  disciples,  and  their  collegiate  institutions.6 

(5.)  Their  manner  of  teaching  varied  with  the  age  in 

Manner  of  which  they  lived.  The  expression  of  thoughts 
teaching.  *n  form  of  poetry  seems  to  have  been  part 

of  the  conception  of  the  prophetic  office  from  the  very 
first.  It  is  involved,  as  we  have  seen,  in  the  sense  of 

1  Amos  vii.  14.  4  See  notes  on  1  Cor.  ix.  5. 

2  2  Kings  iii.  11 ;  v.  22.  5  See  Dr.  Wolff’s  Travels,  ch.  xvii., 

3  Isa.  viii.  3.  xviii.,  xxxiv. 


Lect.  XIX. 


MANNER  OF  TEACHING. 


479 


the  Hebrew  word  Nabi.  It  appears  first  in  the  songs 
of  Moses  and  Miriam.1  It  is  also  implied  by  the  men¬ 
tion  of  the  musical  instruments  in  the  schools  of  Samuel 
and  of  Asaph.2  It  is  illustrated  by  the  incident  in  the 
life  of  Elisha,  who,  though  he  has  left  no  poetical  writ¬ 
ings,  yet  required  a  minstrel  and  harp3  to  call  forth  his 
powers.  It  is  forcibly  exemplified  by  the  grand  burst 
of  sacred  poetry  and  music  in  David ;  and  from  that 
time  most  of  the  Prophets,  whose  writings  have  come 
down  to  us,  wrote  in  verse.  The  historical  chapters  in 
Isaiah  and  Jeremiah  are  however  in  prose  ;  and  it  is 
therefore  probable  that  this  was  also  the  case  with  the 
lost  works,  on  which  the  sacred  history  of  the  Jewish 
Monarchy  is  founded ;  such  as  the  biographies  of  David 
by  Samuel,  Gad,  and  Nathan ;  of  Solomon,  by  Nathan, 
and  Ahijah,  and  Iddo ;  of  Rehoboam,  by  Iddo  and  She- 
maiah;  of  Jehoshaphat  by  Jehu.4  It  is,  perhaps,  from 
the  connection  between  these  lost  writings  and  the 
present  books  of  Samuel  and  Kings,  that  those  books 
are  in  the  Jewish  Canon  reckoned  amongst  the  “  Books 
of  the  Prophets.”  But  these  were  the  exceptions.  The 
general  style  of  the  Jewish  Prophets  was  poetical,  and 
it  is  this  which  made  the  divines  of  the  last  century 
speak  of  the  Prophets  as  the  Poets  of  the  Jewish  nation. 
If  we  no  longer  dare  to  use  the  name,  on  account  of 
the  offence  created  by  it,  at  least  the  fact  is  a  sanc¬ 
tion  to  us  that  poetry  was  regarded  as  a  prophetic 
gift,  and  as  the  fittest  vehicle  of  Divine  Revelation, 
and  that  a  book  is  not  the  less  divine  or  the  less 
canonical  or  the  less  true,  because  it  is  poetical.  Even 
in  the  New  Testament,  there  are,  in  the  more  directly 

1  Ex.  xv.  1,  20,  21;  Deut.  xxxii.,  3  2  Kings  iii.  15. 

xxxiii. ;  Ps.  xc.  4  1  Chron.  xxix.  29  ;  2  Chron.  ix. 

2  1  Sam.  x.  5;  1  Chron.  xxv.  1.  29;  xii.  15;  xx.  34:  xiii.  22. 


480 


HISTORY  OF  THE  PROPHETICAL  ORDER.  Lect.  XIX 


prophetical  parts,  many  lingering  traces  of  the  ancient 
poetic  style.  The  Hebrew  parallelism  may  he  discov¬ 
ered  in  several  of  the  Gospel  discourses.  Some  of  the 
parables,  particularly  of  the  Prodigal  Son,  and  the  Bich 
Man  and  Lazarus,  are  almost  poems.  The  Epistles  have 
their  first  model  in  the  prophetic  epistles  of  Elijah,  Jere¬ 
miah,  and  Baruch ;  and  though  they  are  mostly  in  prose, 
yet  there  are  portions  of  which  the  highly  rhythmical 
character  flows  entirely  in  the  ancient  mould.1  The 
Apocalypse  is  also  thoroughly  poetical  in  structure,  as 
well  as  in  spirit. 

The  styles  which  this  poetry  assumes  are  various. 
It  is  sometimes  lyrical,  sometimes  simply  didactic, 
at  other  times  dramatic.  The  form  which  is  selected 
by  the  Great  Prophet  of  Nazareth  is  that  of  parable 
Parables,  or  apologue.  Of  this  only  a  very  few  instances 
occur  in  the  writings  of  the  earlier  prophets,  as  of 
Nathan  on  the  ewe-lamb,2  and  Isaiah  on  the  vine.3  But, 
in  an  acted  or  symbolical  shape,  this  kind  of  teaching 
is  of  constant  recurrence.  The  rending  of  the  cloak 
of  Samuel  and  of  Ahijah,  the  concealment  of  the  girdle 
of  Jeremiah,  Hananiah’s  breaking  the  yoke,  are  obvious 
instances  •  to  which  in  later  times  we  may  add  the  tak¬ 
ing  of  Paul’s  girdle  by  Agabus,  and  many  of  the  mir¬ 
acles  of  our  Lord,  which,  as  has  been  well  pointed  out, 
have  almost  all  of  them  a  didactic  purport.4  There  are 
some  of  these  acted  parables  which  enter  so  deeply  into 
the  life  of  the  Prophet  himself,  as  to  show  that  he  was 
himself  entirely  identified  with  his  mission.  Such  is  the 
marriage  of  Hosea  with  the  adulteress,  Isaiah’s  walking 
naked  and  barefoot  for  three  years,  the  names  of  Isaiah’s 

1  Rom.  viii.  29-39;  1  Cor.  xiii.  1-8,  2  2  Sam.  xii.  1. 

xv.  35-58;  2  Cor.  vi.  3-10;  James  v.  3  Isa.  v.  1. 

1-6.  4  Dean  Trench  on  the  Miracles. 


Lect.  XIX. 


PROPHECIES  WRITTEN  DOWN. 


481 


children,  and  the  death  of  Ezekiel’s  wife,  with  its  effect 
on  himself. 

All  the  earlier  prophecies  were,  in  the  first  instance, 
delivered  orally.  But,  like  the  effusions  of  Ma-  written 
hornet,  they  were  no  doubt  written  down  soon  down' 
afterwards  by  disciples,  —  such  as,  in  the  case  of  Jere¬ 
miah,  was  Baruch.  In  some  instances,  as  in  the  case  of 
Ezekiel,  and  of  isolated  examples  in  the  life  of  Isaiah,1 
they  were  written  down  by  the  Prophet  himself.  The 
historical  works  above  alluded  to  were  also  probably 
actually  written  by  the  authors  themselves.  Moses  is 
also  said  to  have  written  the  Decalogue  in  its  second 
form,2  and  the  register  of  the  Israelite  wanderings.3 
In  the  New  Testament,  the  utterances  of  Christ,  who 
in  this  respect  conformed  Himself  to  the  greatest  type 
of  the  ancient  Prophets,  were  never  written  by  Him¬ 
self.  The  only  exceptions,  if  they  be  exceptions,  were 
that  unknown  “  writing  on  the  ground,” 4  and  the  tra¬ 
ditional  letter  to  Abgarus.5  The  utterances  of  the 
Apostles  were  for  the  most  part  taken  down  by  scribes, 
such  as  Tertius,  Silvanus,  Tychicus,  who  thus  corre¬ 
sponded  to  Baruch  or  Gehazi.  The  only  certain  cases 
in  the  New  Testament  where  the  Prophets  were  them¬ 
selves  “  the  sacred  penmen  ”  (to  employ  a  modern  ex¬ 
pression  commonly  hut  very  .inexactly  used)  are  the 
Epistle  to  the  Galatians,6  and  the  Epistles  of  S.  John.7 
Most  of  their  utterances,  like  those  of  their  Master, 
were  delivered  on  public  occasions  in  synagogues,  or 
in  assemblies  of  Christians,  as  those  of  the  older  Proph¬ 
ets  had  been  in  the  Temple  courts,  or  on  the  moun 

1  Isa.  viii.  1.  5  Eus.  H.  E.  i.  13. 

2  Ex.  xxxiv.  28.  6  Gal.  vi.  11. 

3  Num.  xxxiii.  2.  7  3  John  13. 

4  John  viii.  6. 

61 


482  HISTORY  OF  THE  PROPHETICAL  ORDER.  Lect.  XIX 


tains  of  Judaea  and  Samaria.  A  peculiar  name  —  by 
our  translators  rendered  burden  —  is  given  to  the  Di¬ 
vine  messages  delivered  by  the  Prophets  on  these 
special  occasions.  It  appears  that  in  the  time  of  Jere¬ 
miah  this  phrase  had  been  so  much  abused  by  the 
Prophets  as  to  have  lost  its  meaning,  and  Jeremiah 
therefore  refuses  to  employ  it 1  —  a  striking  instance 
of  the  duty  of  discarding  even  a  sacred  formula  when 
it  has  been  perverted  or  exhausted. 

(6.)  Different  as  were  the  forms  of  the  Prophetic 
Commu-  Teaching,  there  was  also  an  identity  in  them 
Prophetic  w^ich  largely  contributes  to  the  general  unity 
Writings.  0p  foe  Prophetic  Order,  and  of  the  Bible  itself. 
It  is  evident  that  each  one  looked  upon  his  prede¬ 
cessors’  teaching  as,  in  a  manner,  common  property, 
on  which  he  modelled  his  own,  and  from  which  he 
adapted  and  imitated  without  reserve.  It  is  difficult 
to  say  in  these  cases  whether  the  imitation  is  direct, 
or  whether  each  of  the  similar  passages  was  taken 
from  a  common  source.  On  either  hypothesis,  how¬ 
ever,  the  result  is  the  same  as  to  the  community  of 
the  prophetic  literature.  Thus  Amos  refers  back  to 
Joel,2  Hosea  to  some  unknown  prophet,3  Isaiah  to 
Micah,4  Obadiah  and  Jonah  to  each  other,  or  to  some 
unknown  prophet.5 

In  the  New  Testament  the  same  practice  still  to  a 
certain  extent  continued.  The  Second  Epistle  of  S. 
Peter  and  S.  Jude  either  borrow  from  each  other,  or 
from  a  common  source.6  The  same  argument  illus¬ 
trates,  and  to  some  degree  explains,  the  corresponding 


1  Jer.  xxiii.  30-40.  • 

2  Amos  i.  2  *,  Joel  iii.  16. 

3  Hosea  vii.  12:  vni.  14. 

*  » 

*  Isa.  ii.  2,  4  ;  Micah  iv.  1-4. 


5  Comp,  also  Jer.  xlviii.  1,  2;  Isa. 
xv.  1-4 ;  xxiv.  17,  18  ;  Num.  xi.  28  ; 
xxiv.  17. 

6  2  Pet.  ii.  1-22  ;  Jude  4-16. 


Lect.  XIX. 


ITS  IMPORTANCE. 


483 


phenomenon  of  the  three  first  Gospels.  The  best  key 
to  the  difficulties  of  the  Apocalypse  is  to  be  found 
by  tracking  back  to  their  sources  the  numerous  ima¬ 
ges  and  passages  which  it  has  taken  from  the  older 
Prophets.  And  the  principle  finds  its  highest  exem¬ 
plification  and  sanction  in  the  appropriation  of  the 
existing  traditions  of  the  Rabbinical  schools,  as  well 
as  the  texture  of  the  ancient  prophetic  writings,  by 
Christ  Himself 

These  are  some  of  the  most  striking  characteristics 
of  the  outward  appearance  of  this  vast  institution. 
Even  in  the  dry  enumeration  of  facts,  which  I  have 
just  made,  it  is  impossible  not  to  see  its  importance 
to  the  fortunes  of  the  Jewish  Church,  and  thence  to 
the  world  at  large. 

The  very  name  is  expressive  of  its  great  design. 
If  the  derivation  of  the  word,  as  given  above  importance 
from  Gesenius,  be  correct  —  the  “  boiling  or  office, 
bubbling  over  ”  of  the  Divine  Fountain  of  Inspiration 
within  the  soul  —  it  is  impossible  to  imagine  a  phrase 
more  expressive  of  the  truth  which  it  conveys.  It  is 
one  of  those  words  which  conveys  a  host  of  imagery 
and  doctrine  in  itself.  In  the  most  signal  instances 
of  the  sites  chosen  for  the  Grecian  oracles,  we  find 
that  they  were  marked  by  the  rushing  forth  of  a 
living  spring  from  the  recesses  of  the  native  rocks  of 
Greece,  the  Castalian  spring  at  Delphi,  the  rushing 
stream  of  the  Hercyna  at  Lebedea.  It  was  felt  that 
nothing  could  so  well  symbolize  the  Divine  voice 
speaking  from  the  mysterious  abysses  of  the  unseen 
world,  as  those  inarticulate  but  lively  ebullitions  of 
the  life-giving  element  from  its  unknown  mysterious 
sources.  Such  a  figure  was  even  more  significant  in 


484  HISTORY-  OF  THE  PROPHETICAL  ORDER.  Lect.  XIX. 


the  remoter  East.  The  prophetic  utterances  were  in¬ 
deed  the  bubbling,  teeming  springs  of  life  in  those 
hard  primitive  rocks,  in  those  dry  parched  levels. 
“  My  heart,”  to  use  the  phrase  of  the  Psalmist  in  the 
original  language,1  “is  bursting*,  bubbling  over  with  a 
“  good  matter.”  That  is  the  very  image  which  would 
he  drawn  from  the  abundant  crystal  fountains  which 
all  along  the  valley  of  the  Jordan  pour  forth  their 
full-grown  streams,  scattering  fertility  and  verdure  as 
they  flow  over  the  rough  ground.  And  this  is  the 
exact  likeness  of  the  springs  of  Prophetic  wisdom  and 
foresight,  containing  in  themselves  and  their  accom¬ 
plishments,  the  fulness  of  the  stream  which  was  to 
roll  on  and  fertilize  the  ages.  Even  in  the  other 
great  class  of  languages  —  the  Indo-Germanic  —  the 
same  figure  appears,  and  may  fairly  he  taken  to  illus¬ 
trate  the  Eastern  metaphor.  Ghost  —  Geist  —  the  mov¬ 
ing,  inspiring  spirit,  —  is  the  same  as  the  heaving, 
fermenting  yeast,  the  boiling,  steaming  geyser?  The 
Prophetic  gift  was  to  the  Jewish  Church  exactly  what 
these  combined  metaphors  imply  —  the  fermenting ,  the 
living  element,  which  made  the  dead  mass  move  and 
heave,  and  cast  out  far  and  wide  a  life  beyond  itself. 

The  existence  of  such  an  institution  in  the  midst 
of  an  Eastern  nation,  even  if  we  knew  nothing  of  its 
teaching,  must  be  regarded  as  a  rare  guarantee  for 
liberty,  for  progress,  for  protection  against  many  a 
falsehood.  Even  of  the  modern  Dervishes,  with  all 
their  drawbacks,  it  has  been  said,  that  “  without  them 
“no  man  wTould  be  safe.  They  are  the  chief  people 
“  in  the  East,  who  keep  in  the  recollection  of  Oriental 
“  despots  that  there  are  ties  between  Heaven  and 

1  Ps.  xlv.  1.  fessor  Muller  ( Lectures  on  ilie  Science 

2  See  this  well  brought  out  by  Pro-  of  Language ,  Amer.  Ed.  p.  000). 


Lect.  XIX. 


ITS  IMPORTANCE. 


485 


“  earth.  They  restrain  the  tyrant  in  his  oppression 
“  of  his  subjects;  they  are  consulted  by  courts  and  by 
“  the  counsellors  of  state  in  times  of  emergency ;  they 
“  are,  in  fact,  the  great  benefactors  of  the  human  race 
“  in  the  East.” 1 

Such  in  relation  to  the  mere  brute  power  of  the 
kings  of  Judah  and  Israel,  were  the  Jewish  Proph¬ 
ets,  —  constant,  vigilant,  watch-dogs  on  every  kind 
of  abuse  and  crime,2  even  in  the  highest  ranks,  by 
virtue  of  that  universal,  and  at  the  same  time  eleva¬ 
ted  position  which  I  have  described.  But  they  were 
much  more  than  this.  A  great  philosophical  writer 
of  our  own  time,  Mr.  John  Stuart  Mill,  has  thus  set 
forth  the  position  of  the  Hebrew  Prophets :  — 

“  The  Egyptian  hierarchy,  the  paternal  despotism 
“  of  China,  were  very  fit  instruments  for  carrying 
“  those  nations  up  to  the  point  of  civilization  which 
“  they  attained.  But  having  reached  that  point,  they 
“  were  brought  to  a  permanent  halt,  for  want  of 
“  mental  liberty  and  individuality,  —  requisites  of  im- 
“  provement  which  the  institutions  that  had  carried 
“  them  thus  far  entirely  incapacitated  them  from  ac- 
“  quiring,  and  as  the  institutions  did  not  break  down 
“  and  give  place  to  others,  further  improvement 
“  stopped.  In  contrast  with  these  nations  let  us  con- 
u  sider  the  example  of  an  opposite  character,  afforded 
a  by  another  and  a  comparatively  insignificant  Oriental 
“  people  —  the  Jews.  They,  too,  had  an  absolute  mon- 
“  archy  and  a  hierarchy.  These  did  for  them  what 
“  was  done  for  other  Oriental  races  by  their  institutions 
“  —  subdued  them  to  industry  and  order,  and  gave 
“  them  a  national  life.  But  neither  their  kings  nor 
their  priests  ever  obtained,  as  in  those  other  coun- 

1  Dr.  Wolff’s  Travels.  2  Isa.  lvi.  10. 


486  HISTORY  OF  THE  PROPHETICAL  ORDER.  Lect.  XIX. 

“  tries,  the  exclusive  moulding  of  their  character. 
“  Their  religion  gave  existence  to  an  inestimably  pre- 
“  cious  unorganized  institution,  the  Order  (if  it  may 
“  be  so  termed)  of  Prophets.  Under  the  protection, 
“  generally,  though  not  always  effectual,  of  their  sa- 
“  cred  character,  the  Prophets  were  a  power  in  the 
“  nation,  often  more  than  a  match  for  kings  and 
“  priests,  and  kept  up,  in  that  little  corner  of  the 
“  earth,  the  antagonism  of  influences  which  is  the 
“  only  real  security  for  continued  progress.  Religion 
“  consequently  was  not  there  —  what  it  has  been  in 
“  so  many  other  places  —  a  consecration  of  all  that 
“  was  once  established,  and  a  barrier  against  further 
“  improvement.  The  remark  of  a  distinguished  He- 
“  brew,  that  the  Prophets  were  in  Church  and  State 
“  the  equivalent  of  the  modern  liberty  of  the  press, 
“  gives  a  just  but  not  an  adequate  conception  of  the 
“part  fulfilled  in  national  and  universal  history  by 
“  this  great  element  of  Jewish  life ;  by  means  of 
“  which,  the  canon  of  inspiration  never  being  com- 
“  plete,  the  persons  most  eminent  in  genius  and  moral 
“feeling  could  not  only  denounce  and  reprobate,  with 
“  the  direct  authority  of  the  Almighty,  whatever  ap- 
“  peared  to  them  deserving  of  such  treatment,  but 
“  could  give  forth  better  and  higher  interpretations  of 
“  the  national  religion,  which  thenceforth  became  part 
“  of  the  religion.  Accordingly,  whoever  can  divest 
“  himself  of  the  habit  of  reading  the  Bible  as  if  it 
“  was  one  book,  which  until  lately  was  equally  in- 
“  veterate  in  Christians  and  in  unbelievers,  sees  with 
“  admiration  the  vast  interval  between  the  morality  and 
“  religion  of  the  Pentateuch,  or  even  of  the  historical 
“  books,  and  the  morality  and  religion  of  the  Prophe- 
“  cies,  a  distance  as  wide  as  between  these  last  and 


Lect  XIX. 


ITS  IMPORTANCE. 


487 


“  the  Gospels.  Conditions  more  favorable  to  progress 
“  could  not  easily  exist ;  accordingly  the  Jews,  instead 
“  of  being  stationary,  like  other  Asiatics,  were,  next  to 
u  the  Greeks,  the  most  progressive  people  of  antiquity, 
“  and,  jointly  with  them,  have  been  the  starting-point 
“  and  main  propelling  agency  of  modern  cultivation.” 1 

In  what  way  this  grand  result  was  produced,  not 
merely  by  their  office,  but  by  their  teaching,  and  in 
what  that  teaching  consisted,  —  how  it  is  that  this 
Prophetic  element,  pervading  as  it  does  the  whole 
literature  of  the  Hebrew  nation,  that  is,  the  whole 
Bible,  renders  it  the  storehouse  of  instruction  to  the 
clergy  and  the  teachers  of  all  ages,  and  at  the  same 
time  the  one  inestimable  Book,  dear  to  all  true  lovers 
of  human  progress  and  religious  freedom,  to  be  studied, 
understood,  and  reverenced,  through  good  report  and 
evil,  —  will  be  the  subject  of  the  concluding  discourse. 

1  Representative  Governmental^  42. 


488  HISTORY  OF  THE  PROPHETICAL  ORDER.  Lect.  XIX. 


NOTE  TO  LECTURE  XIX. 

In  the  foregoing  Lecture  the  Biblical  enumeration  of  the  Prophets 
alone  has  been  alluded  to.  But  it  may  be  well  to  add  briefly  the 
enumerations  in  the  Jewish,  Mussulman,  and  Early  Christian  tradi¬ 
tions. 

I.  In  the  Jewish  Canon  the  Prophetical  Books  are  thus  given :  — 

1.  Joshua.  2.  Judges.  3.  The  Books  of  Samuel.  4.  The  Books  of 
Kings.  5.  The  three  Greater  Prophets  (not  Daniel,  or  Lamentations). 

6.  The  twelve  minor  Prophets. 

In  the  Rabbinical  traditions,1  there  are  reckoned  48  Prophets  and  7 
Prophetesses. 

The  48  Prophets :  —  “  1.  Abraham.  2.  Isaac?  3.  Jacob.  4.  Moses. 
5.  Aaron.  6.  Joshua.  7.  Phinehas.  8.  Elkanah.  9.  Eli.  10.  Sam¬ 
uel.  11.  Gad.  12.  Nathan.  13.  David.  14.  Solomon.  15.  Iddo. 
16.  Micaiah.  17.  Obadiah.  18.  Ahijah.  19.  Jehu.  20.  Azariah. 
21.  Jahaziel  (2  Chr.  xx.  14).  22.  Eleazar.  All  these  were  in  the 

days  of  Jehoshaphat.  And  in  the  days  of  Jeroboam,  son  of  Joash, 
23.  Hosea.  24.  Amos.  In  the  days  of  Jotham,  25.  Micah.  In  the 
days  of  Amaziah,  26.  Amoz  (Isaiah’s  father).  27.  Elijah,  28.  Elisha. 
29.  Jonah.  30.  Isaiah.  In  the  days  of  Manasseh,  31.  Joel.  32.  Na¬ 
hum.  33.  Habakkuk.  In  the  days  of  Josiah,  34.  Zephaniah. 
35.  Jeremiah.  In  the  Captivity,  36.  Uriah.  37.  Ezekiel.  38.  Dan¬ 
iel.  In  the  second  year  of  Darius,  39.  Baruch.  40.  Neriah.  41. 
Seraiah.  42.  Maaseiah  (Jer.  li.  59).  43.  Haggai.  44.  Zechariah. 

45.  Malachi.  46.  Mordecai.  In  this  list  by  some  Shemaiah  (2  Chr. 
xi.  2,  xii.  15)  is  substituted  for  Daniel,  and  some  add,  47.  Hanameel , 
and  48.  Shallum  (Jer.  xxxii.  7).  The  7  Prophetesses:  —  1.  Sarah. 

2.  Miriam.  3.  Deborah.  4.  Hannah.  5.  Abigail.  6.  Huldah. 

7.  Esther .” 

II.  The  Mussulman  authorities 8  reckon  from  Adam  to  Mohammed 

1  Given,  from  the  Seder  Olarn ,  by  Fa-  2  Those  names  which  vary  from  the  Bib- 

bricius,  Codex  Pseudepigrctphus  V.  T.  896-  lical  enumeration  are  in  italics. 

901.  3  Jelaladdin,  281. 


Lect.  XIX. 


NOTE  TO  LECTURE  XIX. 


489 


124,000  Prophets,  of  whom  40,000  were  Gentiles,  and  40,000,  Israel¬ 
ites  ;  of  these,  however,  only  314  or  315  possess  supernatural  illumina¬ 
tion  or  “  apostleship.”  Of  these  again  25  are  specially  distinguished  :  — 
Adam,  Seth,  Idris  (Enoch),  Noah,  Saleh  (father  of  Heber),  Abraham, 
Ishmael,  Isaac,  Jacob,  Lot,  Joseph,  Job,  Moses,  Aaron,  Khudr  (the 
mysterious  Immortal *),  Shuaib  (Jethro),  Jonah,  David,  Solomon,  Loh- 
man  (contemporary  of  David,  author  of  the  Fables),  Elijah,  Daniel, 
Zachariah  (father  of  the  Baptist),  Dsul  Kefr  (Ezekiel),  Jahia  Ben 
Zachariah  (the  Baptist),  Isa  (Jesus),  Mohammed.  The  6  preemi¬ 
nent  names  are  of  those  Prophets  who  proclaimed  a  new  Revelation.2 
Four  of  those  who  united  the  office  of  Prophet  and  Apostle  were 
Greeks,  —  Adam,  Seth,  Enoch,  Noah;  4  Arabians,  —  Hud,  Shuaib, 
Saleh,  and  Mohammed.3 

III.  The  Ecclesiastical  enumeration:  — 

1.  Clement  of  Alexandria  (Strom,  i.  21)  : — Adam  (from  his  giving 
names  to  the  animals  and  to  Eve),  Noah  (as  preaching  repentance), 
Moses,  Aaron,  Samuel,  Gad,  Nathan,  Abijah,  Shemaiah,  Jehu,  Elijah, 
Michaiah,  Obadiah,  Elisha,  Abdadonai  (?),  Amos,  Isaiah,  Jonah,  Joel, 
Jeremiah,  Zephaniah,  Ezekiel,  Uriah,  Habakkuk,  Nahum,  Daniel, 
Misael,  the  Angel  or  Messenger  (Malachi). 

2.  Epiphanius : — 1.  Adam.  2.  Enoch.  3.  Noah.  4.  Abraham. 

5.  Isaac.  6.  Jacob.  7.  Moses.  8.  Aaron.  9.  Joshua.  10.  Eldad. 
11.  Medad.  12.  Job.  13.  Samuel.  14.  Nathan.  15.  David.  16.  Gad. 
17.  Jeduihun.  18.  Asaph.  19.  Heman.  20.  Ethan.  21.  Solomon. 
22.  Ahijah.  23.  Shemaiah.  24.  The  Man  of  God,  Hoseth.  25.  Eli 
of  Shiloh.  26.  Joab.  27.  Addo  (Iddo).  28.  Azariah.  29.  Hanani. 
30.  Jehu.  31.  Micaiah.  32.  Elijah.  33.  Oziel  (?),  34.  Eliud. 

35.  Joshua  (Jehu  ?),  the  son  of  Hananiah.  36.  Elisha.  37.  Jonadab. 
38.  Zachariah  or  Azariah.  39.  Another  Zachariah.  40.  Hosea. 
41.  Joel.  42.  Amos.  43.  Obadiah.  44.  Jonah.  45.  Isaiah.  46. 
Micah.  47.  Nahum.  48.  Habakkuk.  49.  Obed.  50.  Abdadon  ? 
51.  Jeremiah.  52.  Baruch.  53.  Zephaniah.  54.  Urijah.  55.  Eze¬ 
kiel.  56.  Daniel.  57.  Ezra.  58.  Haggai.  59.  Zachariah.  60.  Mal¬ 
achi.  61.  Zachariah  (father  of  the  Baptist).  62.  Symeon.  63.  John 
the  Baptist.  Lesser  Prophets  :  —  64.  Enos.  65.  Methuselah.  66.  La- 
mech.  67.  Balaam.  68.  Saul.  69.  Abimelech  or  Ahimelech.  70. 


Amasai  (1  Chr.  xii.  18).  71.  Zadoik.  72.  Old  Prophet  of  Bethel. 

73.  Agabus. 


1  See  Lecture  VIII. 
8  Jelaladdin,  280. 


2  Zeitschrifl  der  Morgenlandischen  Ge- 
sdlschafl ,  vol.  iv.  14,  22. 


62 


490  HISTORY  OF  THE  PROPHETICAL  ORDER.  Lect.  XIX 


Prophetesses  :  —  1.  Sara.  2.  Rebehah.  3.  Miriam.  4.  Deborah. 
5.  Huldah.  6.  Hannah.  7.  Judith.  8.  Elizabeth  (mother  of  John). 
9.  Anna.  10.  Mary. 

In  conventional  pictures  in  Eastern  churches,  Joshua,  Gideon,  Baruch, 
David,  and  Solomon  are  usually  styled  Prophets. 


Lect.  XX.  NATURE  OE  PROPHETICAL  TEACHING. 


491 


LECTURE  XX, 

ON  THE  NATURE  OF  THE  PROPHETICAL  TEACHING. 

In  the  well-known  description  of  the  Revelations  of 
the  Old  Testament  by  the  author  of  the  Epistle  to 
the  Hebrews,1  the  essence  of  these  Revelations  is 
summed  up  in  the  words,  “  God  spake  ly  the  Proph¬ 
ets .”  He  had  in  the  words  immediately  pre-  importance 
ceding  spoken  of  the  various  and  multiform  pitied™" 
gradations  of  Revelation,  and  he  fixes  our  at-  InsPiratlon- 
tention  on  the  special  instructors  or  revealers  of  the 
Divine  Will,  who  stood  on  the  highest  step  of  these 
gradations.  These  are,  in  one  word,  not  the  historians, 
geographers,  ritualists,  poets,  of  the  Jewish  Church, 
—  valuable  as  each  may  be  in  their  several  ways, — 
but  “the  Prophets.”  And  again,  although  it  is  well 
known  that  the  only  full  sense  of  the  word  “Inspira¬ 
tion  ”  is  that  in  which  alone  it  is  used  by  the  Church 
of  England,2  and  the  ancient  Church  generally,  in  the 
far  wider  sense  of  the  universal  mind  of  the  whole 
Church,  and  all  good  in  the  human  heart  and  intel¬ 
lect;  yet  there  is  a  deep  truth  in  the  clause  of  the 
Nicene  Creed,  which  says,  “  The  Holy  Ghost  spake  ” 
(not  by  bishops  or  presbyters,  or  General  Councils, 
or  General  Assemblies,  or  even  saints,  but)  “  ly  the 

1  Heb.  i.  1.  ditions  of  Men.  The  Veni  Creator 

2  The  Collect  before  the  Communion  Spiritus,  the  13th  Article.  These  are 
Service.  The  Collect  for  the  Sunday  the  only  passages  in  the  Anglican  for- 
after  Easter.  The  Prayer  for  all  Con-  mularies  in  which  the  word  occurs. 


492 


NATURE  OF  PROPHETICAL  TEACHING  Lect.  XX. 


Prophets This  limitation  or  concentration  of  the  Di¬ 
vine  Inspiration  to  the  Prophetic  spirit  is  in  exact 
accordance  with  the  facts  of  the  case.  The  Prophets 
being,  as  their  name  both  in  Greek  and  Hebrew  implies, 
the  most  immediate  organs  of  the  Will  of  God,  it  is  in 
their  utterances,  if  anywhere,  that  we  must  expect  to 
find  the  most  direct  expression  of  that  Will.  How¬ 
ever  high  the  sanction  given  to  King  or  Priest,  in 
the  Old  Dispensation,  they  were  always  to  bow  be¬ 
fore  the  authority  of  the  Prophet.  The  Prophetic 
teaching  is,  as  it  were,  the  essence  of  the  Revelation, 
sifted  from  its  accidental  accompaniments.  It  per¬ 
vades,  and,  by  pervading,  gives  its  own  vitality  to 
those  portions  of  the  Sacred  Volume  which  cannot 
strictly  be  called  Prophetical.  Josephus  speaks  of  the 
succession  of  the  Prophets,  as  constituting  the  main 
framework  and  staple  of  the  sacred  canon  of  the  Old 
Testament.1  What  has  been  beautifully  said  of  the 
Psalms  as  compared  with  the  Levitical  and  sacrificial 
system  is  still  more  true  of  the  Prophets.  “  As  we 
“  watch  the  weaving  of  the  web,  we  endeavor  to 
“  trace  through  it  the  more  conspicuous  threads. 
“  Long  time  the  eye  follows  the  crimson :  it  disappears 
“  at  length ;  but  the  golden  thread  of  sacred  prophecy 
“  stretches  to  the  end.” 2  It  stretches  to  the  end ; 
for  it  is  the  chief  outward  link  between  the  Old  and 
the  New  Testament ;  and,  though  the  New  Testament 
has  its  own  peculiarities,  and  though  the  spirit  of 
Prophecy  expresses  chiefly  the  spirit  of  the  Old  Testa¬ 
ment,  yet  it  may  also  fitly  be  called  the  spirit  of  the 
whole  Bible. 

1  Contra  Apion,  i.  8.  This  is  well  2  The  Rev.  H.  B.  Wilson’s  Three 
put  in  Oehler’s  Treatise  on  the  Old  Sermons,  p.  6. 

Testament. 


Lect.  XX. 


OF  THE  PAST. 


493 


It  is  the  substance  of  this  teaching  extending  from 
Moses  the  First,  to  John,  both  in  his  Apocalypse  and 
Gospel,  the  Last  of  the  Prophets,  that  I  here  propose 
to  set  forth ;  with  the  view  of  ascertaining  what  there 
was  in  it  which  gave  to  the  Jewish  people  that  pro¬ 
gressive  movement  of  which  I  spoke  in  the  preceding 
Lecture,  —  that  elevation  and  energy,  which  has  given 
to  all  the  Prophetic  writings  so  firm  a  hold  on  the 
sympathies  of  the  Church  and  of  the  world. 

The  Prophetic  teaching  may  be  divided  into  three 
parts,  according  to  the  three  famous  wrords  of  S.  Ber¬ 
nard,  —  Respice ,  Aspice ,  Prospice.  The  interpretation  of 
the  Divine  Will  respecting  the  Past,  the  Present,  and 
the  Future. 

I.  Of  the  Prophets  as  teachers  of  the  experience  of 
the  Past,  we  know  but  little.  It  is  true  that  The  Proph_ 
we  have  references  to  many  of  the  books  Teachers 
wrhich  they  thus  wrote:  the  acts  of  David,  by  ofthe  Past- 
Samuel,  Gad,  and  Nathan  :  of  Solomon  and  Jeroboam, 
by  Nathan  and  Iddo ;  of  Rehoboam,  by  Iddo  and  Shem- 
aiah.  But  these  unfortunately  have  all  perished. 
Alas !  of  all  the  lost  works  of  antiquity,  is  there  any, 
heathen  or  sacred,  to  be  named  with  the  loss  of  the 
biography  of  David  by  the  Prophet  Nathan  ?  We 
can,  however,  form  some  notion  of  these  lost  books 
by  the  fragments  of  historical  waitings  that  are  left 
to  us  in  the  Prophetical  Books  of  Isaiah  and  Jeremiah, 
and  also  by  the  likelihood  that  some  of  the  present 
canonical  books  were  founded  upon  the  more  ancient 
works  which  they  themselves  must  have  tended  to 
supersede.  And  it  is  probably  not  without  some 
ground  of  this  sort,  that  the  Prophetical  Books  of 
the  Old  Testament,  in  the  Jewish  Canon,  include  the 


494 


NATURE  OF  PROPHETICAL  TEACHING  Lect.  XX, 


Books  of  Joshua,  Judges,  Samuel,  and  Kings.  From 
these  slight  indications  of  the  mission  of  the  Prophets 
as  Historians,  we  cannot  deduce  any  detailed  instruc¬ 
tion.  But  it  is  important  to  have  at  least  this  proof, 
that  the  study  of  history,  so  dear  to  some  of  us,  and 
by  some  so  lightly  thought  of,  was  not  deemed  be¬ 
neath  the  notice  of  the  Prophets  of  God.  And,  if 

we  may  so  far  assume  the  ancient  Jewish  nomencla- 
«/ 

ture  as  to  embrace  the  historical  hooks  of  the  Canon 
just  enumerated  within  the  “  Prophetical  circle,”  their 
structure  furnishes  topics  well  worthy  of  the  consider¬ 
ation  of  the  theological  student.  In  that  marvellously 
tessellated  workmanship  which  they  present,  —  in  the 
careful  interweaving  of  ancient  documents  into  a  later 
narrative,  —  in  the  editing  and  re-editing  of  passages, 
where  the  introduction  of  a  more  modern  name  or 
word  betrays  the  touch  of  the  more  recent  historian, 
—  we  trace  a  research  which  may  well  have  occu¬ 
pied  many  a  vacant  hour  in  the  prophetic  schools  of 
Bethel  or  Jerusalem,  and  at  the  same  time  a  freedom 
of  adaptation,  of  alteration,  of  inquiry,  which  places 
the  authors  or  editors  of  these  original  writings  on  a 
level  far  above  that  of  mere  chroniclers  or  copyists. 
Such  a  union  of  research  and  freedom  gives  us  on 
the  one  hand  a  view  of  the  office  of  an  inspired  or 
prophetic  historian,  quite  different  from  that  wffiich 
would  degrade  him  into  the  lifeless  and  passive  in¬ 
strument  of  a  power  which  effaced  his  individual 
energy  and  reflection ;  and,  on  the  other  hand,  pre¬ 
sents  us  with  something  like  the  model  at  which  an 
historical  student  might  well  aspire  even  in  our  more 
modern  age.  And  if,  from  the  handiwork  and  compo¬ 
sition  of  these  writings,  we  reach  to  their  substance, 
we  find  traces  of  the  same  spirit,  which  will  appear 


Lect.  XX. 


IN  THE  PRESENT. 


495 


more  closely  as  we  speak  of  the  Prophetical  Office  in 
its  two  larger  aspects.  By  comparing  the  treatment 
of  the  history  of  Israel  or  Judah  in  the  four  pro¬ 
phetical  Books  of  Samuel  and  of  Kings,  with  the 
treatment  of  the  same  subject  in  the  Books  of  Chroni¬ 
cles,  we  are  at  once  enabled  to  form  some  notion  of 
the  true  characteristics  of  the  Prophetical  office  as 
distinguished  from  that  of  the  mere  chronicler  or 
Levite.  But  this  will  best  be  understood  as  we  pro¬ 
ceed. 

II.  I  pass  therefore  to  the  work  of  the  Prophets  as 
interpreters  of  the  Divine  Will  in  regard  to  the 
Present 

(1.)  First,  what  was  the  characteristic  of  their  di¬ 
rectly  religious  teaching  which  caused  the  Their 
early  Fathers  to  regard  them  as,  in  the  best  rheol°^* 
sense  of  the  word,  “  Theologians  ?  ” 

It  consisted  of  two  points.  (1.)  Their  proclamation 
of  the  Unity  and  of  the  Spirituality  of  the  Divine 
Nature.  They  proclaimed  the  Unity  of  God,  The  Un. 
and  hence  the  energy  with  which  they  attacked  of  God- 
the  falsehoods  and  superstitions  which  endeavored  to 
take  the  place  of  God.  This  was  the  negative  side 
of  their  teaching,  and  the  force  with  which  they  urge 
it,  the  withering  scorn  with  which  Elijah  and  Isaiah 
speak  of  the  idols  of  their  time,1  however  venerable, 
however  sacred  in  the  eyes  of  the  worshippers,  is  a 
proof  that  even  negative  statements  of  theology  may 
at  times  be  needed,  and  have  at  any  rate  a  standing- 
place  amongst  the  Prophetic  gifts.  The  direct  object 
of  this  negative  teaching  virtually  expired  with  the 
immediate  call  for  it  under  the  Old  Dispensation.  But 
the  positive  side  of  their  teaching  was  the  assertion 


496 


NATURE  OE  PROPHETICAL  TEACHING  Lect.  XX. 


of  the  spirituality,  the  morality  of  God,  His  justice, 
The  Spirit-  His  goodness,  His  love.  This  revelation  of 
God.yof  the  Divine  Essence,  this  manifestation  of  God 
in  some  unusually  impressive  form,  constituted,  as  we 
have  already  seen,  and  shall  see  further  as  we  ad¬ 
vance,  at  once  the  first  call  and  the  sustaining  force 
of  every  Prophetic  mission.  This  continued  to  the 
very  end,  and  received  its  highest  development  in  the 
Prophets  of  the  New  Testament.  Then  the  Prophetic 
teaching  of  the  moral  attributes  of  God  was  brought 
out  more  strongly  than  ever.  Then  Grace  and  Truth 
were  declared  to  be  the  only  means  of  conceiving  or 
approaching  to  the  Divine  Essence.1  Then  He  who 
was  Himself  the  Incarnation  of  that  Grace  and  Truth 
was  enabled  to  say,  as  no  Prophet  before  or  after 
could  have  said,  Ye  “  believe  in  God,  believe  also  in 
Me .”2  To  that  crowning  point  of  the  Prophetic  The- 
ology,  the  Apostolic  Prophets  direct  our  attention  so 
clearly,  that  no  more  needs  to  be  said  on  this  subject. 
The  doctrine  of  the  Incarnation  of  Christ  by  the  last 
of  the  Prophets,  S.  John,  is  the  fitting  and  necessary 
close  of  the  glimpse  of  the  moral  nature  of  the  Di¬ 
vinity  revealed  to  the  first  of  the  Prophets,  Moses. 

(2.)  And  now  how  is  this  foundation  of  the  Prophetic 
Teaching  carried  out  into  detail  ?  This  brings  us  to 
Moral  the  main  characteristic  of  the  Prophetic,  as 
ceremonial  distinguished  from  all  other  parts  of  the  Old 
duties.  Dispensation.  The  elevated  conception  of  the 

Divinity  may  be  said  to  pervade  all  parts  of  the  Old 
Testament,  if  not  in  equal  proportions,  yet  at  least  so 
distinctly  as  to  be  independent  of  any  special  office 
for  its  enforcement.  But  in  the  Prophetical  teaching 
there  is  something  yet  more  peculiarly  its  own. 

1  John  i.  14,  17. 


2  Ibid.  xiv.  1. 


Lect.  XX. 


IN  THE  PEES  ENT. 


497 


The  one  great  corruption,  to  which  all  Religion  is 
exposed,  is  its  separation  from  morality.  The  very 
strength  of  the  religious  motive  has  a  tendency  to 
exclude,  or  disparage,  all  other  tendencies  of  the  human 
mind,  even  the  noblest  and  best.  It  is  against  this  cor¬ 
ruption  that  the  Prophetic  Order  from  first  to  last 
constantly  protested.  Even  its  mere  outward  appear¬ 
ance  and  organization  bore  witness  to  the  greatness 
of  the  opposite  truth,  of  the  inseparable  union  of 
morality  with  religion.  Alone  of  all  the  high  offices 
of  the  Jewish  Church  the  Prophets  were  called  by  no 
outward  form  of  consecration,  and  were  selected  from 
no  special  tribe  or  family.  But  the  most  effective 
witness  to  this  great  doctrine  was  borne  by  their  act¬ 
ual  teaching. 

Amidst  all  their  varieties,  there  is  hardly  a  Prophet, 
from  Samuel  downwards,  whose  life  or  writings  do  not 
contain  an  assertion  of  this  truth.  It  is  to  them  as 
constant  a  topic,  as  the  most  peculiar  and  favorite  doc¬ 
trine  of  any  eccentric  sect  or  party  is  in  the  mouths 
of  the  preachers  of  such  a  sect  or  party  at  the  present 
day,  and  it  is  rendered  more  forcible  by  the  form  which 
it  takes  of  a  constant  protest  against  the  sacrificial  sys¬ 
tem  of  the  Levitical  ritual,  which  they  either,  in  com¬ 
parison  with  the  Moral  Law,  disparage  altogether,  or  else 
fix  their  hearers’  attention  to  the  moral  and  spiritual 
truth  which  lay  behind  it. 

Listen  to  them  one  after  another:  — 

Samuel.  —  “  To  obey  is  better  than  sacrifice,  and  to 
“  hearken  than  the  fat  of  rams.”  1  David.  —  “  Thou 
“  desirest  not  sacrifice ;  else  would  I  give  it.  Thou 
“  delightest  not  in  burnt-offering.  The  sacrifices  of 
“God  are  a  broken  spirit.  Sacrifice  and  burnt-offer- 

1  1  Sam.  xv.  22. 


63 


498 


NATURE  OF  PROPHETICAL  TEACHING  Lect.  XX. 


“  ing  thou  didst  not  desire.  Then  said  I,  Lo,  I  come, 
“  to  do  thy  will,  0  God.” 1  Hosea.  —  “  I  desired  mercy, 
“and  not  sacrifice.”1 2 3  Amos.  —  “I  hate,  I  despise  your 
“feast  days,  and  I  will  not  smell  in  your  solemn  as¬ 
semblies.  Though  ye  offer  me  burnt-offerings,  and 
“your  meat-offerings,  I  will  not  accept  them,  neither 
“will  I  regard  the  peace-offerings  of  your  fat  beasts. 
“  But  let  judgment  run  down  as  waters,  and  righteous- 
“  ness  as  a  mighty  stream.” 3  Micah.  —  “  Shall  I  come 
“before  the  Lord  with  burnt-offerings,  with  calves  of 
“  a  year  old  ?  Will  the  Lord  be  pleased  with  thousands 
“  of  rams,  or  with  ten  thousands  of  rivers  of  oil  ?  shall 
“  I  give  my  first-born  for  my  transgression,  the  fruit  of 
“  my  body  for  the  sin  of  my  soul  ?  He  hath  shewed 
“  thee,  0  man,  what  is  good ;  and  what  doth  the  Lord 
“require  of  thee,  but  to  do  justly,  and  to  love  mercy, 
“and  to  walk  humbly  with  thy  God?”4  Isaiah . — “Your 
“new  moons  and  your  appointed  feasts  my  soul  hateth: 
“  they  are  a  trouble  unto  me ;  I  am  weary  to  bear  them. 
“  Wash  you,  make  you  clean ;  cease  to  do  evil ;  learn  to 
“  do  well.  Is  not  this  the  fast  that  I  have  chosen,  to 
“  loose  the  bands  of  wickedness,  to  undo  the  heavy  bur- 
“  dens,  and  to  let  the  oppressed  go  free  ?  ” 5  Ezekiel.  — 
“  If  a  man  be  just,  and  do  that  which  is  lawful  and 
“  right ...  he  shall  surely  live.  The  soul  that  sinneth, 
“it  shall  die.  .  .  .  When  the  wicked  man  doeth  that 
“  which  is  lawful  and  right,  he  shall  save  his  soul  alive ; 
“  he  shall  surely  live  and  not  die.” 6 

Mercy  and  justice,  judgment  and  truth,  repentance 
and  goodness,  —  not  sacrifice,  not  fasting,  not  ablutions, 
—  is  the  burden  of  the  whole  Prophetic  teaching  of 


1  Ps.  li.  16,  17;  xl.  6-8. 

2  Hosea  vi.  6. 

3  Amos  v.  21-24. 


4  Micah  vi.  6-8. 

5  Isa.  i.  14-1  7 ;  lviii.  6. 

6  Ezek.  xviii.  5-9  ;  20-28. 


Lect.  XX. 


IN  THE  PRESENT. 


499 


the  Old  Testament.  And  it  is  this  which  distinguishes 
at  once  the  Prophetical  from  the  Levitical  portions 
even  of  the  historical  books.  Compare  the  exaltation 
of  moral  duties  in  the  Books  of  Kings  with  the  exal¬ 
tation  of  merely  ceremonial  duties  in  the  Books  of 
Chronicles,  and  the  difference  between  the  two  ele¬ 
ments  of  the  Sacred  history  is  at  once  apparent. 

In  the  New  Testament  the  same  doctrine  is  repeal¬ 
ed  in  terms  slightly  altered,  but  still  more  emphatic. 
In  the  words  of  Him  who.  is  our  Prophet  in  this  the 
truest  sense  of  all,  I  need  only  refer  to  the  Sermon 
on  the  Mount,1  and  to  the  remarkable  fact  that  His 
chief  warnings  are  against  the  ceremonial,  the  narrow, 
the  religious  world  of  that  age.2  In  His  deeds,  I  need 
only  refer  to  His  death  —  proclaiming  as  the  very 
central  fact  and  doctrine  of  the  New  Religion,  that 
sacrifice,  henceforth  and  forever,  consists  not  in  the 
blood  of  bulls  and  goats,3  but  in  the  perfect  surrender 
of  a  perfect  Will  and  Life  to  the  perfect  Will  of  an 
All  Just  and  All  Merciful  God.  In  the  Epistles  the 
same  Prophetic  strain  is  still  carried  on  by  the  eleva¬ 
tion  of  the  spirit  above  the  letter,4  of  love  above  all 
other  gifts,5  of  edification  above  miraculous  signs,6  of 
faith  and  good  works  above  the  outward  distinction  of 
Jews  and  Gentiles.7  With  these  accents  on  his  lips, 
the  Last  of  the  Prophets  expired.8 

It  is  this  assertion  of  the  supremacy  of  the  moral 
and  spiritual  above  the  literal,  the  ceremonial,  and  the 
dogmatical  elements  of  religion,  which  makes  the  con¬ 
trast  between  the  Prophets  and  all  other  sacred  bodies 

1  Matt,  v.-vii.  6  Ibid.  xiv.  5. 

2  Ibid.  xv.  1-20,  xxiii. ;  Luke  xv.  7  Rom.  ii.  29  ;  Gal.  ii.  5,  20,  vi. 

3  Heb.  x.  7.  15  ;  Tit.  ii.  8. 

4  2  Cor.  iii.  6.  8  1  John  ii.  3,  4 ;  Jerome,  on  Gal. 

5  1  Cor.  xiii.  1,  2. 


vi. 


500 


NATURE  OE  PROPHETICAL  TEACHING  Lect.  XX. 


which  have  existed  in  Pagan,  and,  it  must  even  be 
added,  in  Christian  times.  They  were  religious  teach¬ 
ers  without  the  usual  faults  of  religious  teachers.  They 
were  a  religious  body,  whose  only  professional  spirit 
was  to  be  free  from  the  usual  prejudices,  restraints, 
and  crimes  by  which  all  other  religious  professions 
have  been  disfigured.  They  are  not  without  grievous 
shortcomings;  they  are  not  on  a  level  with  the  full 
light  of  the  Christian  Revelation.  But,  taken  as  a 
whole,  the  Prophetic  order  of  the  Jewish  Church  re¬ 
mains  alone.  It  stands  like  one  of  those  vast  monu¬ 
ments  of  ancient  days,  —  with  ramparts  broken,  with 
inscriptions  defaced,  but  stretching  from  hill  to  hill, 
conveying  in  its  long  line  of  arches  the  rill  of  living 
water  over  deep  valley  and  thirsty  plain,  far  above 
all  the  puny  modern  buildings  which  have  grown 
up  at  its  feet,  and  into  the  midst  of  which  it  strides 
with  its  massive  substructions,  its  gigantic  height,  its 
majestic  proportions,  unequalled  and  unrivalled. 

We  cannot  attain  to  it.  But  even  whilst  we  relin- 
Exampie  fiuish  the  hope,  even  whilst  we  admire  the 
Christian  g°°J  Providence  of  God,  which  has  preserved 
ciergy.  for  us  fois  unapproachable  memorial  of  His 

purposes  in  former  ages,  there  is  still  one  calling  in 
the  world  in  which,  if  any,  the  Prophetic  spirit,  the 
Prophetic  mission,  ought  at  least  in  part  to  live  on, 
—  and  that  is,  the  calling  of  the  Christian  clergy. 
We  are  not  like  the  Jewish  Priests,  we  are  not  like 
the  Jewish  Levites,  but  we  have,  God  be  praised,  some 
faint  resemblances  to  the  Jewish  Prophets.  Like  them, 
we  are  chosen  from  no  single  family  or  caste ;  like 
them,  we  are  called  not  to  merely  ritual  acts,  but  to 
teach  and  instruct;  like  them,  we  are  brought  up  in 
great  institutions  which  pride  themselves  on  fostering 


Lect.  XX. 


IN  THE  PRESENT. 


501 


the  spirit  of  the  Church  in  the  persons  of  its  Minis¬ 
ters.1  0  glorious  profession,  if  we  would  see  our¬ 
selves  in  this  our  true  Prophetic  aspect!  We  all  know 
what  a  powerful  motive  in  the  human  mind  is  the 
spirit  of  a  profession,  the  spirit  of  the  order,  the  spirit 
(as  the  French  say)  of  the  body,  to  which  we  belong. 
Oh  if  the  spirit  of  our  profession,  of  our  order,  of  our 
body,  were  the  spirit,  or  anything  like  the  spirit,  of 
the  ancient  Prophets !  if  with  us,  truth,  charity,  jus¬ 
tice,  fairness  to  opponents,  were  a  passion,  a  doctrine, 
a  point  of  honor,  to  be  upheld,  through  good  report 
and  evil,  with  the  same  energy  as  that  with  which 
we  uphold  our  position,  our  opinions,  our  interpreta¬ 
tions,  our  partnerships !  A  distinguished  prelate 2  has 
well  said,  “  It  makes  all  the  difference  in  the  world 
“  whether  we  put  the  duty  of  Truth  in  the  first  place, 
“  or  in  the  second  place.”  Yes !  that  is  exactly  the 
difference  between  the  spirit  of  the  world  and  the 
spirit  of  the  Bible.  The  spirit  of  the  world  asks, 
first ,  "  Is  it  safe,  Is  it  pious  ?  ”  secondly ,  “  Is  it  true  ?  ” 
The  spirit  of  the  Prophets  asks,  first,  "  Is  it  true  ?  ” 
secondly,  “  Is  it  safe  ?  ”  The  spirit  of  the  world  asks, 
first,  “  Is  it  prudent  ?  ”  secondly,  “  Is  it  right  ?  ”  The 
spirit  of  the  Prophets  asks,  first,  "Is  it  right?”  sec¬ 
ondly,  “  Is  it  prudent  ?  ”  It  is  not  that  they  and  we 
hold  different  doctrines  on  these  matters,  hut  that  we 
hold  them  in  different  proportions.  What  they  put 
first,  we  put  second ;  what  we  put  second,  they  put 
first.  The  religious  energy  which  wTe  reserve  for  ob¬ 
jects  of  temporary  and  secondary  importance,  they 
reserved  for  objects  of  eternal  and  prinu  ry  impor¬ 
tance.  When  Ambrose  closed  the  doors  of  the  church 
of  Milan  against  the  blood-stained  hands  of  the  devout 
1  See  Lecture  XVIII.  2  Archbishop  Whately 


502 


NATURE  OF  PROPHETICAL  TEACHING  Lect.  XX. 


Theodosius,  he  acted  in  the  spirit  of  a  prophet. 
When  Ken,  in  spite  of  his  doctrine  of  the  Divine 
right  of  Kings,  rebuked  Charles  II.  on  his  death-bed 
for  his  long-un repented  vices,  those  who  stood  by  were 
justly  reminded  of  the  ancient  Prophets.  When  Sa¬ 
vonarola,  at  Florence,  threw  the  whole  energy  of  his 
religious  zeal  into  burning  indignation  against  the  sins 
of  the  city,  high  and  low,  his  sermons  read  more  like 
Hebrew  prophecies  than  modern  homilies. 

We  speak  sometimes  with  disdain  of  moral  essays, 
as  dull,  and  dry,  and  lifeless.  Dull,  and  dry,  and 
lifeless  they  truly  are,  till  the  Prophetic  spirit  breathes 
into  them.  But  let  religious  faith  and  love  once  find 
its  chief,  its  proper  vent  in  them,  as  it  did  of  old  in 
the  Jewish  Church,  —  let  a  second  Wesley  arise  who 
shall  do  what  the  Primate  of  his  day  wisely  but  vainly 
urged  as  his  gravest  counsel  on  the  first  Wesley,1  — 
that  is,  throw  all  the  ardor  of  a  Wesley  into  the 
great  unmistakable  doctrines  and  duties  of  life  as  they 
are  laid  down  by  the  Prophets  of  old  and  by  Christ 
in  the  Gospels,  —  let  these  be  preached  with  the  same 
fervor  as  that  with  which  Andrew  Melville  enforced 
Presbyterianism,  or  Laud  enforced  Episcopacy,  or  Whit¬ 
field  Assurance,  or  Calvin  Predestination,  —  then,  per¬ 
chance,  we  shall  understand  in  some  degree  what  was 
the  propelling  energy  of  the  Prophetic  order  in  the 
Church  and  Commonwealth  of  Israel. 

3.  This  is  the  most  precious,  the  most  supernatural, 
Appeal  of  all  the  Prophetic  gifts.  Let  me  pass  on  to 
consciences  the  next,  wdiich  brings  out  the  same  character- 
hearers.  is  ic  in  another  and  equally  peculiar  aspect. 
The  Prophets  not  merely  laid  down  these  general 
principles  of  theology  and  practice,  but  wrere  the  di* 

1  See  Wesley’s  Life,  i.  222. 


Lect.  XX. 


IN  THE  PRESENT. 


503 


rect  oracles  and  counsellors  of  their  countrymen  in 
action  ;  and  for  this  was  required  the  Prophetic  in¬ 
sight  into  the  human  heart,  which  enabled  them  to 
address  themselves  not  merely  to  general  circum¬ 
stances,  hut  to  the  special  emergencies  of  each  partic¬ 
ular  case.  Often  they  were  consulted  even  on  trifling 
matters,  or  on  stated  occasions.  So  Saul  wished  to  ask 
Samuel  after  his  father :  “  When  men  went  to  inquire 
of  God,  then  they  spake,  Come,  let  us  go  to  the  Seer.”1 
So  the  Shunamite  went  at  new  moons  or  Sabbaths,2 
to  consult  the  man  of  God  on  Carmel.  But  more 
usually  they  addressed  themselves  spontaneously  to 
the  persons  or  the  circumstances  which  most  needed 
encouragement  or  warning.  Suddenly,  whenever  their 
interference  was  called  for,  they  appeared,  to  encour¬ 
age  or  to  threaten ;  Elijah,  before  Ahab,  like  the 
ghost  of  the  murdered  Naboth  on  the  vineyard  of 
Jezreel ;  Isaiah,  before  Aliaz  at  the  Fuller’s  Gate,  be¬ 
fore  Hezekiah,  as  he  lay  panic-struck  in  the  palace ; 
Jeremiah,  before  Zedekiah;  John,  before  Herod;  the 
Greatest  of  all,  before  the  Pharisees  in  the  Temple. 
Whatever  public  or  private  calamity  had  occurred  was 
seized  by  them  to  move  the  national  or  individual 
conscience.  Thus  Elijah  spoke,  on  occasion  of  the 
drought ;  Joel,  on  occasion  of  the  swarm  of  locusts ; 
Amos,  on  occasion  of  the  earthquake.  Thus,  in  the 
highest  degree,  our  Lord,  as  has  been  often  ob¬ 
served,  drew  His  parables  from  the  scenes  immedi¬ 
ately  around  Him.  What  the  ear  received  slowly, 
was  assisted  by  the  eye.  What  the  abstract  doctrine 
failed  to  effect,  was  produced  by  its  impersonation  in 
the  living  forms  of  nature,  in  the  domestic  incidents 
of  human  intercourse.  The  Apostles,  in  this  respect, 

1  1  Sam.  ix.  9.  2  2  Kings  iv.  23. 


504 


NATURE  OF  PROPHETICAL  TEACHING  Lkct.  XX 


by  adopting  the  written  mode  of  communication,  are 
somewhat  more  removed  from  personal  contact  with 
those  whom  they  taught  than  were  the  older  Prophets. 
But  S.  Paul  makes  his  personal  presence  so  felt  in  all 
that  he  writes,  fastens  all  his  remarks  so  closely  on 
existing  circumstances,  as  to  render  his  Epistles  a 
means,  as  it  were,  of  reproducing  himself.  He  almost 
always  conceives  himself  “  present  with  them  in  spirit,” 1 
as  speaking  to  his  reader  “face  to  face.”2  Every  sen¬ 
tence  is  full  of  himself,  of  his  readers,  of  his  circum¬ 
stances,  of  theirs.  And  in  accordance  with  this  is  his 
description  of  the  effect  of  Christian  prophesying. 
“  If  all  prophesy,  and  there  come  in  one  that  be- 
“  lieveth  not,  or  one  unlearned,  he  is  convinced  of 
“all,  he  is  judged  of  all.”3  That  is,  one  prophet  after 
another  shall  take  up  the  strain,  and  each  shall 
reveal  to  him  some  fault  which  he  knew  not  before. 
One  after  another  shall  ask  questions  which  shall 
reveal  to  him  his  inmost  self,  and  sit  as  judge  on  his 
inmost  thoughts,  “and  thus”  (the  Apostle  continues) 
“  the  secrets  of  his  heart  are  made  manifest ,  and  so 
“falling  down  on  his  face”  (awe-struck)  “he  will  wor- 
“ship  God,  and  report  that  God  is  in  you  of  a  truth .” 

This  is  the  true  definition  by  one  of  the  mightiest 
Prophets,  of  what  true  Prophesying  is,  —  what  it  is  in 
its  effects,  and  why  it  is  an  evidence  of  a  Real,  or 
Divine  Presence,  wherever  it  is  found.  It  is  this 
close  connection  with  the  thoughts  of  men,  this  ap¬ 
peal  to  their  hearts  and  consciences,  this  reasoning 
together  with  every  one  of  us,  which,  on  the  one 
hand,  makes  the  interpretation  of  Scripture,  especially 
of  the  Prophetic  Scriptures,  so  dependent  on  our 
knowledge  of  the  characters  of  those  to  wrhom  each 

1  1  Cor.  y.  3,  4.  2  2  Cor.  xiii.  2.  3  1  Cor.  xiv.  24,  25. 


Lect.  XX. 


IN  THE  PRESENT. 


505 


part  is  addressed,  which,  on  the  other  hand,  makes 
each  portion  bear  its  own  lesson  to  each  individual 
soul.  “  Thou  art  the  man.” 1  So  in  the  fulness  of 
the  Prophetic  spirit  Nathan  spoke  to  David,  and  so 
in  a  hundred  voices  God  through  that  goodly  com¬ 
pany  of  Prophets  still  speaks  to  us,  and  “convinces 
us”  of  our  sin  and  of  His  Presence. 

And  has  this  Prophetic  gift  altogether  passed  away 
from  our  reach  ?  Not  altogether.  That  divine  intui¬ 
tion,  that  sudden  insight  into  the  hearts  of  men,  is, 
indeed,  no  longer  ours,  or  ours  only  in  a  very  limited 
sense.  Still  it  fixes  for  us  the  standard  at  which  all 
preachers  and  teachers  should  aim.  Not  our  thoughts, 
but  the  thoughts  of  our* hearers,  is  wdiat  we  have  to 
explain  to  ourselves  and  to  them.  Not  in  our  lan¬ 
guage,  but  in  theirs,  must  we  speak,  if  we  mean  to 
make  ourselves  understood  by  them.  By  talking 
with  the  humblest  of  the  poor  in  the  parishes  where 
our  lot  as  pastors  is  cast,  we  shall  gain  the  best  ma¬ 
terials  —  materials  how  rich  and  how  varied  and  how 
just  —  for  our  future  sermons.  By  addressing  our¬ 
selves,  not  to  any  imaginary  congregation,  or  to  any 
abstract  and  distant  circumstances,  but  to  the  actual 
needs  which  we  know,  in  the  hearts  of  our  neighbors 
and  ourselves,  we  shall  rouse  the  sleeper,  and  startle 
the  sluggard,  and  convince  the  unbelievers,  and  en¬ 
lighten  the  unlearned.  So  the  great  Athenian  teacher, 
—  the  nearest  approach  to  a  Jewish  or  Christian 
Prophet  that  the  Gentile  world  ever  produced,  —  so 
Socrates  worked  his  way  into  the  minds  of  the  Grecian, 
and  so  of  the  European  world.  “  To  him,”  as  has 
been  well  said  by  his  modern  biographer,  “the  pre¬ 
cept  knew  thyself  was  the  holiest  of  texts.”2  He  ap- 

1  2  Sam.  xii.  7.  2  Grote’s  History  of  Greece ,  viii.  602. 

64 


506 


NATURE  OF  PROPHETICAL  TEACHING  Lect.  XX. 


plied  it  to  himself,  he  applied  it  to  others,  and  the 
result  was  the  birth  of  all  philosophy.  But  not  less 
is  it  the  basis  of  all  true  prophesying,  of  all  good 
preaching,  of  all  sound  preparation  for  the  pastoral 
office. 

4.  Another  characteristic  of  the  teaching  of  the 
Relations  Prophets  to  be  briefly  touched  upon  is  to  be 
Country,  found  in  their  relation  not  to  individuals,  but 
to  the  state.  At  one  time  they  were  actually  the 
leaders  of  the  nation,  as  in  the  case  of  Moses,  Debo¬ 
rah,  Samuel,  David  •  in  earlier  times  their  function 
in  this  respect  was  chiefly  to  maintain  the  national 
spirit  by  appeals  to  the  Divine  help,  and  to  the  past 
recollections  of  their  history*.  This  function  became 
more  complex  as  the  Israelitish  affairs  became  more 
entangled  with  those  of  other  nations.  But  still, 
throughout,  three  salient  points  stand  out.  The  first 
is,  that,  universal  as  their  doctrine  was,  and  far  above 
any  local  restraints  as  it  soared,  they  were  thoroughly 
absorbed  in  devotion  to  their  country.  To  say  that 
they  were  patriots,  that  they  were  good  citizens,  is  a 
very  imperfect  representation  of  this  side  of  the  Pro- 
Patriotism.  phetic  character.  They  were  one  with  it, 
they  were  representatives  of  it ;  they  mourned,  they 
rejoiced  with  it,  and  for  it,  and  through  it.  Often 
we  cannot  distinguish  between  the  Prophet  and  the 
people  for  whom  he  speaks.1  Of  that  uneasy  hostility 
to  the  national  mind,  which  has  sometimes  marked 
even  the  noblest  of  disappointed  politicians  and  of 
disaffected  churchmen,  there  is  hardly  any  trace  in 
the  Hebrew  Prophet.  And  although  with  the  changed 
relations  of  the  Jewish  Commonwealth,  the  New  Tes¬ 
tament  Prophets  could  no  longer  hold  the  same  posi- 

1  See  especially  Isa.  xl.-liv. ;  Lamentations  ili.  1-66. 


Lect.  XX. 


IN  THE  PRESENT. 


507 


tion,  yet  even  then  the  national  feeling  is  not  ex¬ 
tinct.  Christ  Himself  wept  over  His  country.1  His 
Prophecy  over  Jerusalem2  is  a  direct  continuation  of 
the  strain  of  the  older  Prophets.  The  same  may  he 
said  of  S.  Paul’s  passionate  allusions  to  his  love  for 
the  Jewish  people  in  the  Epistle  to  the  Romans,3 
which  are  almost  identical  with  those  of  Moses.4  I 
will  not  go  further  into  the  enlargement  of  this  feel¬ 
ing,  as  it  followed  the  expansion  of  the  Jewish  into 
the  Christian  Church.  It  is  enough  that  our  atten¬ 
tion  should  be  called  to  this  example  for  the  teachers 
of  every  age.  Public  spirit,  devotion  to  a  public 
cause,  indignation  at  a  public  wrong,  enthusiasm  in 
the  national  welfare,  —  this  was  not  below  the  loftiest 
of  the  ancient  Prophets;  it  surely  is  still  within  the 
reach  of  the  humblest  of  Christian  teachers. 

Again,  they  labored  to  maintain,  and  did  to  a  con¬ 
siderable  degree  maintain,  in  spite  of  the  divergence 
of  tribes,  and  disruption  of  the  monarchy,  the  state 
of  national  unity.  The  speech  of  Oded  reproaching 
the  northern  kings  for  the  sale  of  the  prisoners  of 
the  south  is  a  sample  of  the  whole  prophetic  spirit. 
“  Now  ye  purpose  to  keep  under  the  children  of 
“  Judah  and  Jerusalem  for  bondmen  and  bondwomen 
a  unto  you :  but  are  there  not  with  you,  even  with 
“  you,  sins  against  the  Lord  your  God  ?  ” 5  To  Unity, 
balance  the  faults  of  one  part  of  the  nation  against 
the  other  in  equal  scales,  was  their  difficult  but  con¬ 
stant  duty.6  To  look  forward  to  the  time  when 
Judah  should  no  more  vex  Ephraim,  nor  Ephraim 
envy  Judah,7  was  one  of  their  brightest  hopes.  If  at 

1  Luke  xix.  41.  5  2  Ckron.  xxviii.  10. 

2  Matt.  xxiv.  6  Ezek.  xvi. 

3  Rom.  ix.  3,  x.  1,  xi.  1.  7  Isa.  xi.  13. 

4  Ex.  xxxii,  32. 


508 


NATURE  OF  PROPHETICAL  TEACHING  Lect.  X 


times,  they  increased  the  bitterness  of  the  division, 
yet  on  the  whole  their  aim  was  union,  founded  on  a 
sense  of  their  common  origin  and  worship,  overpow¬ 
ering  the  sense  of  their  separation  and  alienation. 

And  thirdly,  and  as  a  consequence  of  this,  we  are 
struck  by  the  variety,  the  moderation  of  the  Propheti¬ 
cal  teaching,  changing  with  the  events  of  their  time. 

It  is  instructive  to  see  how  at  different  epochs  dip* 
simplicity  ferent  evils  attracted  their  attention ;  how  the 
and  variety  same  institutions,  which  at  one  time  seemed 

of  applica¬ 
tion. 

Contrast  Isaiah’s  denunciation  of  the  hierarchy  with 
Malachi’s  support  of  them.1  Contrast  Isaiah’s  confi¬ 
dence  against  Assyria  with  Jeremiah’s  despair  before 
Chaldsea.2  There  is  no  one  Shibboleth  handed  down 
through  the  whole  series.  Only  the  simple  faith  in  a 
few  great  moral  and  religious  principles  remains,  the 
rest  is  constantly  changing.  Only  the  poor  are  con¬ 
stantly  protected  against  the  rich ;  only  the  weaker 
side  is  always  regarded  with  the  tender  compassion 
which  belongs  especially  to  Him  to  whom  all  the 
Prophets  bare  witness.  To  the  poor,  to  the  oppressed, 
to  the  neglected,  the  Prophet  of  old  was  and  is  still 
the  faithful  friend.  To  the  selfish,  the  luxurious,  the 
insolent,  the  idle,  the  frivolous,  the  Prophet  was  and 
is  still  an  implacable  enemy.3 

It  is  this  aspect  which  has  most  forcibly  brought 
out  the  well-known  likeness  of  the  Prophets  both  to 
ancient  orators  and  modern  statesmen.4  The  often- 

1  Isa.  i.  10  ;  Malachi  i.  8  (See  ject,  Nov.  1830  ( Life  and  Corresp. 

Arnold’s  Life ,  i.  259).  i.  234,  235). 

2  Isa.  xxxvii.  0  ;  Jer.  xxxvii.  8.  4  Comp.  Hebrew  Politics  in  the  time 

3  Isa.  iii.  14,  v.  8,  xxxii.  5  ;  Jer.  of  Sennacherib  and  Sargon,  by  Sir  E. 
v.  5,  xxii.  13;  Amos  vi.  3  ;  James  v.  Straehey;  also  The  Prophets  of  the 
l.  See  Arnold’s  Letters  on  this  sub-  Old  Testament ;  in  Tracts  for  Priests 

and  People ,  No.  8. 


good,  at  another  seemed  fraught  with  evil. 


Lect.  XX. 


IN  THE  PRESENT. 


509 


quoted  lines  of  Milton  best  express  both  the  resem¬ 
blance  and  the  difference  :  — 

“  Their  orators  thou  then  extoH’st,  as  those 
The  top  of  eloquence  ;  statists  indeed, 

And  lovers  of  their  country,  as  may  seem ; 

But  herein  to  our  Prophets  far  beneath, 

As  men  divinely  taught,  and  better  teaching 
The  solid  rules  of  civil  government, 

In  their  majestic,  unaffected  style, 

Than  all  the  oratory  of  Greece  and  Rome. 

In  them  is  plainest  taught,  and  easiest  learnt, 

What  makes  a  nation  happy,  and  keeps  it  so, 

What  ruins  kingdoms,  and  lays  cities  flat ; 

These  only  with  our  law  best  form  a  king.”  1 

5.  One  point  yet  remains  in  connection  with  their 
teaching  —  and  that  is  their  absolute  indepen-  Indepen_ 
dence.  Most  of  them  were  in  opposition  to  dence> 
the  prevailing  opinion  of  their  countrymen  for  the 
time  being.  Some  of  them  were  persecuted,  some  of 
them  were  in  favor  with  God  and  man  alike.  But  in 
all,  there  was  the  same  Divine  Prophetic  spirit  —  of 
elevation  above  the  passions,  and  prejudices,  and  dis¬ 
tractions  of  common  life.  “  Be  not  afraid  of  them ; 
“be  not  afraid  of  their  faces;  be  not  afraid  of  their 
“  words.  Speak  my  words  unto  them,  whether  they 
“  will  hear,  or  whether  they  will  forbear.”  “  I  have 
“  made  thy  face  strong  against  their  faces,  and  thy 
“  forehead  strong  against  their  foreheads  :  as  an  ada- 
“  mant  harder  than  flint  I  have  made  thy  forehead ; 
“  fear  them .  not,  neither  be  dismayed.” 2  This  is  the 
position  of  all  the  Prophets,  in  a  greater  or  less  de¬ 
gree  —  it  is  the  position,  in  the  very  highest  sense  of 
all,  of  Him  whose  chief  outward  characteristic  it  was 
that  He  stood  high  above  all  the  influences  of  His 
age,  and  was  the  Bock  against  which  they  dashed  in 

1  Parad.  Reg.  iv.  353.  2  Ezek.  ii.  6,  7 ;  iii.  8,  9. 


510 


NATURE  OF  PROPHETICAL  TEACHING  Lect.  XX. 


vain,  and  on  which  they  were  ground  to  powder. 
This  element  of  the  Prophetical  Office  deserves  special 
consideration,  because  it  pervades  their  whole  teach¬ 
ing,  and  because  it  is  in  its  lower  manifestations 
within  the  reach  of  all.  What  is  it  that  is  thus  rec¬ 
ommended  to  us  ?  Not  eccentricity,  not  singularity, 
not  useless  opposition  to  the  existing  framework  of 
the  world,  or  the  Church  in  which  we  find  ourselves. 
Not  this  —  which  is  of  no  use  to  any  one  —  but  this 
which  is  needed  by  every  one  of  us,  a  fixed  resolu¬ 
tion  to  hold  our  own  against  chance  and  accident, 
against  popular  clamor  and  popular  favor,  against  the 
opinions,  the  conversation,  of  the  circle  in  which  we 
live  ;  a  silent  look  of  disapproval,  a  single  word  of 
cheering  approval  —  an  even  course,  which  turns  not 
to  the  right  hand  or  to  the  left,  unless  with  our  own 
full  conviction  —  a  calm,  cheerful,  hopeful  endeavor  to 
do  the  work  that  has  been  given  us  to  do,  whether 
we  succeed  or  whether  we  fail. 

And  for  this  Prophetic  independence,  what  is,  what 
was,  the  Prophetic  ground  and  guaranty  ?  There 
were  two.  One  was  that  of  which  I  will  proceed  to 
speak  presently,  —  that  which  has  almost  changed  the 
meaning  of  the  name  of  the  Prophets,  —  their  constant 
looking  forward  to  the  Future.  The  other  was  that 
they  felt  themselves  standing  on  a  rock  that  was 
higher  and  stronger  than  they,  —  the  support  and  the 
presence  of  God.  It  was  this  which  made  their  inde¬ 
pendent  elevation  itself  a  Prophecy,  because  it  spoke 
of  a  Power  behind  them,  unseen,  yet  manifesting  it¬ 
self  through  them  in  that  one  quality  which  even 
the  world  cannot  fail  at  last  to  recognize.  Give  us  a 
man,  young  or  old,  high  or  low,  on  whom  we  know 
that  we  can  thoroughly  depend,  —  who  will  stand 


i 


Lect.  XX. 


OF  THE  FUTURE. 


511 


firm  when  others  fail,  —  the  friend  faithful  and  true, 
the  adviser  honest  and  fearless,  the  adversary  just  and 
chivalrous ;  in  such  an  onO  there  is  a  fragment  of 
the  Rock  of  Ages  —  a  sign  that  there  has  been  a 
Prophet  amongst  us. 

The  consciousness  of  the  presence  of  God.  In  the 
Mussulman  or  the  Hindoo  this  makes  itself  felt  in  the 
entire  abstraction  of  the  mind  from  all  outward  things. 
In  the  fanatic,  of  whatever  religion,  it  makes  itself 
felt  in  the  disregard  of  all  the  common  rules  of  hu¬ 
man  morality.  In  the  Hebrew  Prophet  it  makes  itself 
felt  in  the  indifference  to  human  praise  or  blame,  in 
the  unswerving  fidelity  to  the  voice  of  duty  and  of 
conscience,  in  the  courage  to  say  what  he  knew  to  be 
true,  and  do  what  he  knew  to  be  right.  This  in  the 
Hebrew  Prophet  —  this  in  the  Christian  man  —  is  the 
best  sign  of  the  near  vision  of  Almighty  God  ;  it  is 
the  best  sign  of  the  Real  Presence  of  Jesus  Christ, 
the  Faithful  and  True,  the  Holy  and  the  Just,  the 
Power  of  God,  and  the  Wisdom  of  God. 

III.  This  brings  us  to  the  Prophetic  teaching  of  the 
Future.  It  is  well  known  that  in  the  popular  The  . 

.  A  x  teaching  of 

and  modern  use  of  the  word  since  the  seven- the  Future, 
teenth  century,  by  a  “ Prophet”  is  meant  almost  ex¬ 
clusively  one  who  predicts  or  foretells ;  and  to  have 
asserted  the  contrary  has  even  been  thought  heretical. 
We  have  already  seen  that  this  assumption  is  itself 
a  grave  error.1  It  is  wholly  unauthorized,  either  by 

the  Bible  or  by  our  own  Church.  It  has  drawn  off 

* 

1  See  Lecture  XIX.  “  It  is  sim-  “  cient  words  for  prophecy  all  refer  to 
“ply  a  mistake  to  regard  prediction  as  “a  state  of  the  mind,  an  emotion,  an 
“  synonymous  with  prophecy,  or  even  “  influence,  and  not  to  prescience.” 
“  as  the  chief  portion  of  a  prophet’s  (Mr.  Payne  Smith’s  Mes.sio.nic  Inter - 
“duties.  Whether  the  language  be  pretation  of  Isaiah,  Introd.  p.  xxx.) 

Hebrew,  Greek,  or  Latin,  the  an- 


512 


NATURE  OF  PROPHETICAL  TEACHING  Lect.  XX. 


the  attention  from  the  fundamental  idea  of  the  Pro¬ 
phetical  office  to  a  subordinate  part.  It  has  caused 
us  to  seek  the  evidence  of  Prophecy  in  those  portions 
of  it  which  are  least  convincing,  rather  than  in  those 
which  are  most  convincing — in  those  parts  which  it  has 
most  in  common  with  other  systems,  rather  than  in 
those  parts  which  distinguish  it  from  all  other  systems. 

But  this  error,  resting  as  it  does  on  an  etymological 
mistake,  could  never  have  obtained  so  wide  a  diffusion, 
without  some  ground  in  fact ;  and  this  ground  is  to  be 
found  in  the  vast  relation  of  the  Prophetic  office  to  the 
Future,  which  I  shall  now  attempt  to  draw  forth — dwell¬ 
ing,  as  before,  on  the  general  spirit  of  the  institution. 

It  is,  then,  undoubtedly  true  that  the  Prophets  of  the 
Prospec-  Old  Dispensation  did  in  a  marked  and  especial 

predictive  manner  look  forward  to  the  Future.  It  was 
tendencies,  -f-pjg  gave  to  the  whole  Jewish  nation  an 

upward,  forward,  progressive  character,  such  as  no  Asi¬ 
atic,  no  ancient,  I  may  almost  say,  no  other  nation  has 
ever  had  in  the  same  degree.  Representing  as  they 
did  the  whole  people,  they  shared  and  they  personated 
the  general  spirit  of  tenacious  trust  and  hope  that  dis¬ 
tinguishes  the  people  itself.  Their  warnings,  their  con¬ 
solations,  their  precepts,  when  relating  to  the  past  and 
the  present,  are  clothed  in  imagery  drawn  from  the 
future.  The  very  form  of  the  Hebrew  verb,  in  which 
one  tense  is  used  both  for  the  past  and  the  future, 
lends  itself  to  this  mode  of  speech.  They  were  con¬ 
ceived  as  shepherds  seated  on  the  top  of  one  of  the 
hills  of  Judaea,  seeing  far  over  the  heads  of  their  flocks, 
and  guiding  them  accordingly ;  or  as  watchmen  stand¬ 
ing  on  some  lofty  tower,  with  a  wider  horizon  within 
their  view  than  that  of  ordinary  men.1  “  Watchman, 

1  Isa.  lvi.  10,  11. 


Lect.  XX. 


OF  THE  FUTURE. 


513 


» 


what  of  the  night?  Watchman,  what  of  the  night?”1 
was  the  question  addressed  to  Isaiah  by  an  anxious 
world  below.  “  I  will  stand  upon  my  watch,”  is  the 
expression  of  Habakkuk,  “  and  set  me  upon  the  tower, 
“and  will  watch  to  see  what  He  will  say  unto  me. 
“  Though  the  vision  tarry,  wait  for  it :  it  will  surely 
“come;  it  will  not  tarry.”2  Their  practical  and  relig¬ 
ious  exhortations  were,  it  is  true,  conveyed  with  a 
force  which  needed  no  further  attestation.  Of  all  of 
them,  in  a  certain  sense,  it  might  be  said  as  of  the 
Greatest  of  all,  that  they  spoke  “as  one  having  au¬ 
thority  and  not  as  the  scribes.”  Still  there  are  special 
signs  of  authority  besides,  and  of  these,  one  of  the  chief, 
from  first  to  last,  was  their  “speaking  things  to  come ”3 
And  this  token  of  Divinity  extends  (and  here  again 
I  speak  quite  irrespectively  of  any  special  fulfil¬ 
ments  of  special  predictions)  to  the  whole  Prophetic 
order,  in  Old  and  New  Testament  alike.  There  is 
nothing  which  to  any  reflecting  mind  is  more  signal 
a  proof  of  the  Bible  being  really  the  guiding  book 
of  the  world’s  history,  than  its  anticipations,  predic¬ 
tions,  insight,  into  the  wants  of  men  far  beyond  the 
age  in  which  it  was  written.  That  modern  element 
which  we  find  in  it,  —  so  like  our  own  times,  so  un¬ 
like  the  ancient  framework  of  its  natural  form ;  that 
Gentile,  European,  turn  of  thought,  —  so  unlike  the 
Asiatic  language  and  scenery  which  was  its  cradle; 
that  enforcement  of  principles  and  duties,  which  for 
years  and  centuries  lay  almost  unperceived,  because 

1  Isa.  xxi.  11.  pie,  Elijah,  and  John  the  Baptist,  hav- 

2  Hab.  ii.  1,  3.  ing  uttered  either  no  prediction  or 

3  It  is  observable  that  although  the  only  such  as  were  very  subordinate), 
power  of  prediction  is  never  made  the  the  failure  of  a  prediction  is  in  one 
test  of  a  true  prophet  (some  of  the  remarkable  passage  made  the  test  of 
greatest  of  them,  Samuel,  for  exam-  a  false  prophet  (Deut.  xviii.  22). 

65 


514 


NATURE  OF  PROPHETICAL  TEACHING  Lect.  XX. 


hardly  ever  understood  in  its  sacred  pages  ;  but  which 
we  now  see  to  be  in  accordance  with  the  utmost  re¬ 
quirements  of  philosophy  and  civilization  ;  those  prin¬ 
ciples  of  toleration,  chivalry,  discrimination,  proportion, 
which  even  now  are  not  appreciated  as  they  ought  to 
be,  and  which  only  can  be  fully  realized  in  ages  yet 
to  come ;  these  are  the  unmistakable  predictions  of  the 
Prophetic  spirit  of  the  Bible,  the  pledges  of  its  inex¬ 
haustible  resources. 

Thus  much  for  the  general  aspect  of  the  Prophetical 
office  as  it  looked  to  the  Future.  Its  more  special 
aspects  may  be  considered  under  three  heads. 

(1.)  First,  their  contemplation  and  prediction  of  the 
Political  political  events  of  their  own  and  the  surround- 

predic-  . 

tions.  ing  nations.  It  is  this  which  brings  them  most 
nearly  into  comparison  with  the  seers  of  other  ages  and 
other  races.  Every  one  knows  instances,  both  in  an¬ 
cient  and  modern  times,  of  predictions  which  have  been 
uttered  and  fulfilled  in  regard  to  events  of  this  kind. 
Sometimes  such  predictions  have  been  the  result  of 
political  foresight.  “  To  have  made  predictions  which 
“  have  been  often  verified  by  the  event,  seldom  or 
“  never  falsified  by  it,”  has  been  suggested  by  one  well 
competent  to  judge,1  as  an  ordinary  sign  of  statesman¬ 
ship  in  modern  times.  “  To  see  events  in  their  begin- 
“  nings,  to  discern  their  purport  and  tendencies  from 
“  the  first,  to  forewarn  his  countrymen  accordingly,” 
was  the  foremost  duty  of  an  ancient  orator,  as  described 
by  Demosthenes.2  Many  instances  will  occur  to  stu¬ 
dents  of  history.  Even  within  our  own  memory  the 
great  catastrophe  of  the  disruption  of  the  United  States 

1  Mill’s  Representative  Government ,  Strachey  on  the  Prophets  of  the  Old 

224.  Testament ,  pp.  2,  29. 

2  De  Corona,  73.  See  Sir  E. 


Lect.  XX. 


OF  THE  FUTURE. 


515 


of  America  was  foretold,  even  with  the  exact  date, 
several  years  beforehand.1  Sometimes  there  has  been 
an  anticipation  of  some  future  epoch  in  the  pregnant 
sayings  of  eminent  philosophers  or  poets ;  as  for  ex¬ 
ample,  the  intimation  of  the  discovery  of  America  by 
Seneca ;  or  of  Shakspeare  by  Plato,  or  the  Reformation 
by  Dante.  Sometimes  the  same  result  has  been  pro¬ 
duced  by  a  power  of  divination,  granted,  in  some  in¬ 
explicable  manner,  to  ordinary  men.  Of  such  a  kind 
were  many  of  the  ancient  oracles,  the  fulfilment  of 
which,  according  to  Cicero,2  could  not  be  denied  with¬ 
out  a  perversion  of  all  history.  Such  was  the  fore¬ 
shadowing  of  the  twelve  centuries  of  Roman  dominion 
by  the  legend  of  the  apparition  of  the  twelve  vultures 
to  Romulus,3  and  which  was  so  understood  four  hun¬ 
dred  years  before  its  actual  accomplishment.4  Such, 
but  with  less  certainty,  was  the  traditional  prediction 
of  the  conquest  of  Constantinople  by  the  Mussulmans ; 
the  alleged  predictions  by  Archbishop  Malachi,  whether 
composed  in  the  eleventh  or  the  sixteenth  century,  of 
the  series  of  Popes  down  to  the  present  time ;  not  to 
speak  of  the  well-known  instances  which  are  recorded 
both  in  French  and  English  history.5  But  there  are 
several  points  which  at  once  place  the  Prophetic  predic¬ 
tions  on  a  different  level  from  any  of  these.  It  is  not 
that  they  are  more  exact  in  particulars  of  time  and 
place;  none  can  be  more  so  than  that  of  the  twelve 
centuries  of  the  Roman  Empire ;  and  our  Lord  Him¬ 
self  has  excluded  the  precise  knowledge  of  times  and 

1  Spence  on  the  American  Union ,  ces  of  more  or  less  value,  see  a  col- 

p.  7.  lection  in  Das  Buck  der  Wahr-  und 

2  De  Divinatione,  i.  19.  Weis- Sag  ungen,  published  at  Ratis- 

3  Gibbon,  ch.  35.  bon,  1850,  or  in  the  smaller  French 

4  Ibid.  ch.  52.  work,  Le  Livre  de  Toutes  les  Pro - 

5  For  these,  and  many  other  instan-  phe'ties  et  Predictions ,  Paris,  1849. 


516 


NATURE  OF  PROPHETICAL  TEACHING  Lect.  XX. 


seasons  from  the  widest  and  highest  range  of  the 
prophetic  vision.  The  difference  rather  lies  in  their 
close  connection  with  the  moral  and  spiritual  charac¬ 
ter  of  the  Prophetic  mission,  and  their  freedom  (for 
the  most  part)  from  any  of  those  fantastic  and  arbi¬ 
trary  accompaniments  by  which  so  many  secular  pre¬ 
dictions  are  distinguished.  They  are  almost  always 
founded  on  the  denunciations  of  moral  evil,  or  the  ex¬ 
altation  of  moral  good,  not  on  the  mere  localities  or 
cities  concerned.  The  nations  whose  doom  is  pro¬ 
nounced  thus  become  representatives  of  moral  princi¬ 
ples  and  examples  to  all  ages  alike.  Israel,  Jerusalem, 
Egypt,  Babylon,  Tyre,  are  personifications  of  states  or 
principles  still  existing,1  and  thus  the  predictions  con¬ 
cerning  them  have,  as  Lord  Bacon  says,  constantly 
germinant  fulfilments.  The  secular  events  which  are 
thus  predicted  are  (with  a  few  possible  exceptions2) 
within  the  horizon  of  the  Prophet’s  age,  and  are  thus 
capable  of  being  turned  to  the  practical  edification  of 
the  Prophet’s  own  age  and  country.  As  in  the  vision 
of  Pisgah,  the  background  is  suggested  by  the  fore¬ 
ground.  No  object  is  introduced  which  a  contemporary 
could  fail  to  appreciate  and  understand  in  outline,  al¬ 
though  its  remoter  and  fuller  meaning  might  be  re¬ 
served  for  a  far  distant  future.  These  predictions  are 
also,  in  several  striking  instances,  made  dependent  on 
the  moral  condition  of  those  to  whom  they  are  ad¬ 
dressed,  and  are  thus  divested  of  the  appearance  of 
blind  caprice  or  arbitrary  fate,  in  which  the  literal 
predictions  of  both  ancient  and  modern  divination  so 

1  This  is  well  brought  out  in  Ar-  else  admit  (on  quite  independent 

nold’s  Sermons  on  Prophecy.  grounds)  of  another  explanation. 

2  The  cases  referred  to  are  such  Other  occasions  will  occur  for  treat- 
as  need  not  be  here  discussed.  They  ing  them  in  detail. 

are  either  confessedly  exceptional,  or 


Lect.  XX. 


OF  THE  FUTURE. 


517 


much  delight.  “  Yet  forty  days  and  Nineveh  shall  be 
“  overthrown.”  No  denunciation  is  more  absolute  in  its 
terms  than  this ;  and  of  none  is  the  frustration  more 
complete.  The  true  Prophetic  lesson  of  the  Book  of 
Jonah  is,  that  there  was  a  principle  in  the  moral  gov¬ 
ernment  of  God,  more  sacred  and  more  peremptory  even 
than  the  accomplishment  of  the  most  cherished  predic¬ 
tion.  “God  saw  their  works,  that  they  turned  from 
“  their  evil  way ;  and  God  repented  of  the  evil,  that 
“  He  had  said  that  He  would  do  unto  them  •  and  He 
“did  it  not.”1  What  here  appears  in  a  single  case  is 
laid  down  as  a  universal  rule  by  the  Prophet  Jeremiah. 
“At  what  instant  I  shall  speak  concerning  a  nation 
“ .  .  .to  destroy  it ;  if  that  nation  .  .  .  turn  from 
“  their  evil,  I  will  repent  of  the  evil  that  I  thought  to 
“  do  unto  them.  And  at  what  instant  I  shall  speak  con- 
“  cerning  a  nation  ...  to  build  and  to  plant  it ;  if  it 
“  do  evil  in  my  sight,  that  it  obey  not  my  voice,  then 
“  I  will  repent  of  the  good  wherewith  I  said  I  would 
“benefit  them.”2 

With  these  limitations,  it  is  acknowledged  by  all 
students  of  the  subject,  that  the  Hebrew  prophets 
made  predictions  concerning  the  fortunes  of  their 
own  and  other  countries  which  were  unquestionably 
fulfilled.3  There  can  be  no  reasonable  doubt,  for  ex¬ 
ample,  that  Amos  foretold  the  captivity  and  return 
of  Israel ;  and  Michael  the  fall  of  Samaria ;  and  Eze¬ 
kiel  the  fall  of  Jerusalem ;  and  Isaiah  the  fall  of 
Tyre ;  and  Jeremiah  the  limits  of  the  Captivity.  But, 
even  if  no  such  special  cases  could  be  proved,  the 
grandeur  of  the  position  which  the  Prophets  occu¬ 
py  in  this  respect  is  one  which  it  needs  no  attes¬ 
tation  of  any  particular  prediction  to  enhance,  and 

1  Jonah  iii.  10.  2  Jer.  xviii.  7-9.  3  See  Ewald  (1st  Ed.),  iii.  303. 


518  NATURE  OF  PROPHETICAL  TEACHING  Lect.  XX 

which  no  failure  of  any  particular  prediction  can  im¬ 
pair.  From  those  lofty  watch-towers  of  Divine  spec¬ 
ulation,  from  that  moral  and  spiritual  height  which 
raised  them  far  above  the  rest  of  the  ancient  world, 
they  saw  the  rise  and  fall  of  other  nations,  long  be¬ 
fore  it  was  visible  to  those  nations  themselves.  "  They 
“  were  the  first  in  all  antiquity,”  it  has  been  well 
said,  "to  perceive  that  the  old  East  was  dead;  they 
"  celebrated  its  obsequies,  in  advance  of  the  dissolu- 
"  tion  which  they  saw  to  be  inevitable.” 1  They  were, 
as  Dean  Milman  has  finely  expressed  it,  the  "  great 
"  Tragic  Chorus  of  the  awful  drama  that  was  unfold- 
“  ing  itself  in  the  Eastern  world.  As  each  independent 
"  tribe  or  monarchy  was  swallowed  up  •  in  the  uni- 
“  versal  empire  of  Assyria,  the  seers  of  Judah  watched 
"  the  progress  of  the  invader,  and  uttered  their  sub- 
“  lime  funeral  anthems  over  the  greatness  and  pros- 
"  perity  of  Moab  and  Ammon,  Damascus  and  Tyre.” 2 
And  in  those  funeral  laments  and  wide-reaching  pre¬ 
dictions  we  trace  a  foretaste  of  that  universal  sym¬ 
pathy  with  nations  outside  the  chosen  circle,  —  of 
that  belief  in  an  all-embracing  Providence,  —  which 
has  now  become  part  of  the  belief  of  the  highest  in¬ 
telligence  of  the  world.  There  may  be  many  inno¬ 
cent  questions  about  the  date,  or  about  the  interpre¬ 
tation  of  the  Book  of  Daniel,  and  of  the  Apocalypse. 
But  there  can  be  no  doubt  that  they  contain  the 
first  germs  of  the  great  idea  of  the  succession  of 
ages,  of  the  continuous  growth  of  empires  and  races 
under  a  law  of  Divine  Providence,  the  first  sketch 
of  the  Education  of  the  world,  and  the  first  outline 
of  the  Philosophy  of  History.3 

1  Quinet,  Genie  des  Religions ,  p.  2  History  of  the  Jews ,  i.  298. 

372.  3  See  Liicke,  On  S.  John ,  iv.  154. 


Lect.  XX. 


OF  THE  FUTURE. 


519 


(2.)  I  pass  to  the  second  grand  example  of  the 
predictive  spirit  of  the  Prophets.  It  was  the  Messianic 
distinguishing  mark  of  the  Jewish  people  that  Sns!°" 
their  golden  age  was  not  in  the  past,  but  in  the 
future;  that  their  greatest  Hero  (as  they  deemed 
Him  to  be)  was  not  their  founder,  but  their  founder’s 
latest  descendant.  Their  traditions,  their  fancies,  their 
glories,  gathered  round  the  head  not  of  a  chief,  or 
warrior,  or  sage  that  had  been,  but  of  a  King,  a  De¬ 
liverer,  a  Prophet  who  was  to  come.  Of  this  singu¬ 
lar  expectation  the  Prophets  were,  if  not  the  chief 
authors,  at  least  the  chief  exponents.  Sometimes  He 
is  named,  sometimes  He  is  unnamed;  sometimes  He 
is  almost  identified  with  some  actual  Prince  of  the 
coming  or  the  present  generation,  sometimes  He 
recedes  into  the  distant  ages.1  But  again  and  again, 
at  least  in  the  later  Prophetic  writings,  the  vista  is 
closed  by  His  person,  His  character,  His  reign.  And 
almost  everywhere  the  Prophetic  spirit,  in  the  deline¬ 
ation  of  His  coming,  remains  true  to  itself.  He  is  to 
be  a  King,  a  Conqueror,  yet  not  by  the  common 
weapons  of  earthly  warfare,  but  by  those  only  weapons 
which  the  Prophetic  order  recognized,  —  by  justice, 
mercy,  truth,  and  goodness,  —  by  suffering,  by  endur¬ 
ance,  by  identification  of  Himself  with  the  joys,  the 
sufferings  of  His  nation,  by  opening  a  wider  sym¬ 
pathy  to  the  whole  human  race  than  had  ever  been 
opened  before.2  That  this  expectation,  however  ex¬ 
plained,  existed  in  a  greater  or  less  degree  amongst 
the  Prophets,  is  not  doubted  by  any  theologians  of 
any  school  whatever.  It  is  no  matter  of  controversy. 
It  is  a  simple  and  universally  recognized  fact,  that, 

2  Ps.  xlv.  4,  lxxii.  11-14;  Isa.  xl. 
1-9,  liii.  1-9  ;  Jer.  xxxii.  15,  16. 


1  See  Ewald,  iii.  428,  9. 


520 


NATURE  OF  PROPHETICAL  TEACHING  Lect.  XX 


filled  with  these  Prophetic  images,  the  whole  Jewish 
nation  —  nay,  at  last  the  whole  Eastern  world  —  did 
look  forward  with  longing  expectation  to  the  coming 
of  this  future  Conqueror.  Was  this  unparalleled  ex¬ 
pectation  realized  ?  And  here  again  I  speak  only  of 
facts  which  are  acknowledged  by  Germans  and 
Frenchmen,  no  less  than  by  Englishmen,  by  critics 
and  by  sceptics,  even  more  fully  than  by  theologians 
and  ecclesiastics.  There  did  arise  out  of  this  nation 
a  Character  by  universal  consent  as  unparalleled  as 
the  expectation  which  had  preceded  Him.  Jesus  of 
Nazareth  was,  on  the  most  superficial  no  less  than  on 
the  deepest  view  we  take  of  His  coming,  the  greatest 
name,  the  most  extraordinary  power,  that  has  ever 
crossed  the  stage  of  History.  And  this  greatness  con¬ 
sisted  not  in  outward  power,  but  precisely  in  those 
qualities  in  which  from  first  to  last  the  Prophetic 
order  had  laid  the  utmost  stress, — justice  and  love, 
goodness  and  truth. 

I  push  this  argument  no  further.  Its  force  is 
weakened  the  moment  we  introduce  into  it  any  con¬ 
troverted  detail.  The  fact  which  arrests  our  atten¬ 
tion  is,  that  side  by  side  with  this  great  expecta¬ 
tion,  appears  the  great  climax  to  which  the  whole 
History  leads  up.  It  is  a  proof,  if  anything  can  be 
a  proof,  of  a  unity  of  design,  in  the  education  of  the 
Jews,  in  the  history  of  the  world.  It  is  a  proof  that 
the  events  of  the  Christian  Dispensation  were  planted 
on  the  very  centre  of  human  hopes  and  fears.  It  is 
a  proof  that  the  noblest  hopes  and  aspirations  that 
were  ever  breathed  were  not  disappointed;  and  that 
when  “  God  spake  by  the  Prophets  ”  of  the  coming 
Christ,  He  spake  of  that  which  in  His  own  good 
time  He  was  certain  to  bring  to  pass. 


Lect.  XX. 


OF  THE  FUTURE. 


521 


(3.)  There  is  one  further  class  of  predictions  in  which 
the  Prophetic  writings  abound,  and  which  still  more 
directly  connects  itself  with  their  general  spirit,  and 
of  which  the  predictions  I  have  already  noticed  are 
only  a  part,  —  the  Future,  as  a  ground  of  consolation 
to  the  Church,  to  individuals,  to  the  human  race.  It 
is  this  which  gives  to  the  Bible  at  large  that  hopeful, 
victorious,  triumphant  character,  which  distinguishes  it 
from  the  morose,  querulous,  narrow,  desponding  spirit 
of  so  much  false  religion,  ancient  and  modern.  The 
Poiver  of  the  Future .  —  This  is  the  fulcrum  by  which 
they  kept  up  the  hopes  of  their  country,  and  on  its 
support  we  can  rest  as  well  as  they. 

The  Future  of  the  Church.  —  I  need  not  repeat  those 
glorious  predictious  which  are  familiar  to  all.  Predic. 
But  their  spirit  is  applicable  now  as  well  as 
then.  Although,  in  this  sense,  we  prophesy Church- 
and  predict,  as  it  were  at  second-hand  from  them,  yet 
our  anticipations  are  so  much  the  more  certain,  as 
they  are  justified  and  confirmed  by  the  experience, 
which  the  Prophets  had  not,  of  two  thousand  years 
ago.  We  may  be  depressed  by  this  or  that  failure  of 
good  projects,  of  lofty  aspirations.  But  the  Prophets 
and  the  Bible  bid  us  look  onward.  The  world,  they 
tell  us,  as  a  whole  tends  forwards  and  not  backwards. 
The  losses  and  backslidings  of  this  generation,  if  so 
be,  will  be  repaired  in  the  advance  of  the  next.  “  To 
one  far-off  Divine  event,”  slowly  it  may  be  and  un¬ 
certainly,  but  still  steadily  onwards,  u  the  whole  cre¬ 
ation  moves.”  Work  on  in  faith,  in  hope,  in  confi¬ 
dence  ;  the  future  of  the  Church,  the  future  of  each 
particular  society  in  which  our  lot  is  cast,  is  a  solid 
basis  of  cheerful  perseverance.  The  very  ignorance 

of  the  true  spirit  of  the  Bible  of  which  we  complain, 

66 


522 


NATURE  OF  PROPHETICAL  TEACHING  Lect.  XX. 


is  the  best  pledge  of  its  boundless  resources  for  the 
future.  The  doctrines,  the  precepts,  the  institutions, 
which  as  yet  lie  undeveloped,  far  exceed  in  richness, 
in  power,  those  that  have  been  used  out,  or  been  fully 
applied. 

The  Future  of  the  Individual.  —  Have  we  ever 
Predic-  thought  of  the  immense  stress  laid  by  the 
of°the  Prophets  on  this  mighty  thought  ?  What  is 
individual,  ^he  sentence  with  which  the  Church  of  Eng¬ 
land  opens  its  morning  and  evening  service,  but  a 
Prophecy,  a  Prediction,  of  the  utmost  importance  to 
every  human  soul  ?  “  When  the  wicked  man  shall  turn 

“  away  from  his  wickedness,  and  doeth  that  which  is 
“  lawful  and  right,  he  shall  save  his  soul  alive!'  So  spoke 
Ezekiel,1  advancing  beyond  the  limits  of  the  Mosaic 
law.  So  spoke  no  less  Isaiah2  and  Micah:3  “Though 
“  your  sins  be  as  scarlet,  they  shall  be  as  white  as 
“  snow.”  “  He  will  turn  again ;  He  will  have  compas- 
“  sion  upon  us.  He  will  subdue  our  iniquities.  Thou 
“  wilt  cast  all  their  sins  into  the  depths  of  the  sea.” 
So  spoke,  in  still  more  endearing  accents,  the  Prophet 
of  Prophets,  Jesus  Christ  Himself,  when  He  uttered 
His  world-wide  invitation,  “Him  that  cometh  to  me, 
“  I  will  in  no  wise  cast  out.”  “  Her  sins  which  are 
“  many  are  forgiven.”  “  Go  and  sin  no  more.”  The 
Future  is  everything  to  us,  the  Past  is  nothing.  The 
turn,  the  change,  the  fixing  our  faces  in  the  right, 
instead  of  the  wrong  direction,  —  this  is  the  difficulty, 
this  is  the  turning-point,  this  is  the  crisis  of  life. 

But  that  once  done,  the  Future  is  clear  before  us. 

The  despondency  of  the  human  heart,  the  timidity 

or  the  austerity  of  Churches  or  of  sects,  may  refuse 
this  great  Prophetic  absolution;  may  cling  to  pen- 


1  Ezek.  xviii.  27. 


2  Isa.  i.  18. 


3  Micah  vii.  19. 


Lect.  XX. 


OF  THE  FUTURE. 


523 


ances  and  regrets  for  the  past ;  may  shrink  from  the 
glad  tidings  that  the  good  deeds  of  the  Future  can 
blot  out  the  sorrows  and  the  sins  of  the  Past.  But 
the  whole  Prophetic  teaching  of  the  Old  and  New 
Testament  has  staked  itself  on  the  issue;  it  hazards 
the  bold  prediction  that  all  will  be  well  when  once 
we  have  turned;  it  bids  us  go  courageously  forward, 
in  the  strength  of  the  Spirit  of  God,  in  the  power 
of  the  life  of  Christ. 

There  is  yet  one  more  Future,  —  a  future  which  to 
the  Prophets  of  old  was  almost  shut  out,  but  Predic. 
which  it  is  the  glory  of  the  Prophets  ofp°"®r°fa 
the  New  Dispensation  to  have  predicted  to Llfe' 
us  with  unshaken  certainty,  —  the  Future  life.  In 
this  respect,  the  predictions  of  the  latest  of  the 
Prophets  far  transcend  those  which  went  before.  The 
heathen  philosophers  were  content  with  guesses  on 
the  immortal  future  of  the  soul.  The  elder  Hebrew 
Prophets  were  content,  for  the  most  part,  with  the 
consciousness  of  the  Divine  support  in  this  life  and 
through  the  terrors  of  death,  but  did  not  venture  to 
look  further.  But  the  Christian  Prophets,  gathering  up 
the  last  hopes  of  the  Jewish  Church  into  the  first  hopes 
of  the  Christian  Church,  throw  themselves  boldly  on 
the  undiscovered  world  beyond  the  grave,  and  fore¬ 
tell  that  there  the  wishes  and  fears  of  this  world 
would  find  their  true  accomplishment.  To  this  Pre¬ 
diction  so  confident,  yet  so  strange  at  the  time,  the 
intelligence  no  less  than  the  devotion  of  mankind  has 
in  the  course  of  ages  come  round.  Powerful  minds, 
which  have  rejected  much  beside  in  the  teaching  of 
the  Bible,  have  claimed  as  their  own  this  last  expec¬ 
tation  of  the  simple  Prophetic  school,  which  founded 
its  hopes  on  the  events  of  that  first  Easter  day,  that 


524  NATURE  OF  PROPHETICAL  TEACHING  Lect.  XX. 

first  day  of  the  week,  “  when  life  and  immortality 
were  brought  to  light.”  And  it  is  a  prediction  which 
shares  the  character  of  all  the  other  truly  Prophetic 
utterances;  in  that  it  directly  bears  on  the  present 
state  of  being.  Even  without  dwelling  on  the  special 
doctrine  of  judgment  and  retribution,  the  mere  fact  of 
the  stress  laid  by  the  Prophets  on  the  certainty  of  the 
Future  is  full  of  instruction,  hardly  perhaps  enough 
borne  in  mind.  Look  forwards,  we  sometimes  say,  a 
few  days  or  a  few  months,  and  how  differently  will  all 
things  seem.  Yes ;  but  look  forwards  a  few  more 
years ;  and  how  yet  more  differently  will  all  things 
seem.  From  the  height  of  that  Future,  to  which  on 
the  wings  of  the  ancient  Prophetic  belief  we  can 
transport  ourselves,  look  back  on  the  present.  Think 
of  our  troubles,  as  they  will  seem  when  we  know 
their  end.  Think  of  those  good  thoughts  and  deeds 
which  alone  will  survive  in  that  unknown  world. 
Think  of  our  controversies,  as  they  will  appear,  when 
we  shall  be  forced  to  sit  down  at  the  feast  with 
those  whom  we  have  known  only  as  opponents  here, 
but  whom  we  must  recognize  as  companions  there. 
To  that  Future  of  Futures  which  shall  fulfil  the 
yearnings  of  all  that  the  Prophets  have  desired  on 
earth,  it  is  for  us,  wherever  we  are,  to  look  onwards, 
upwards,  and  forwards,  in  the  constant  expectation 
of  something  better  than  we  see  or  know.  Uncer¬ 
tain  as  to  “  the  day  and  hour,” 1  and  as  to  the 
manner  of  fulfilment,  this  last  of  all  the  Predictions 
still,  like  those  of  old,  builds  itself  upon  the  past  and 
present.  “  It  doth  not  yet  appear  what  we  shall  be ; 
“  but  we  know  that  when  He  shall  appear,  we  shall 
“  be  like  Him;  for  we  shall  see  Him  as  He  is.”2 


1  Mark  xiii.  32. 


9  1  John  iv.  2. 


t 


\ 

APPENDIX  I. 

THE  TRADITIONAL  LOCALITIES  OF  ABRAHAM’S 

MIGRATION. 


APPENDIX  II. 

THE  CAVE  OF  MACHPELAH. 


APPENDIX  III. 

THE  SAMARITAN  PASSOVER. 


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APPENDIX  I. 


— • — 

NOTE  A.  ON  LECTURE  I. 
TRADITIONAL  LOCALITIES  OF  ABRAHAM’S  MIGRATION. 


I.  Where  was  Ur  of  the  Chaldees ? 

There  are  four  claimants  :  — 

1.  Ur*  a  fortress  on  the  Tigris  near  Hatra,  mentioned  only  by 
Ammianus  Marcellinus  (xxv.  8),  apparently  the  mod-  Kaleh 
ern  Kaleh  Sherghat,  on  the  western  bank  of  the  Tigris,  Sher£hat- 
between  the  Greater  and  Lesser  Zab.1  To  this  no  traditional 
sanctity  is  attached.  The  arguments  in  its  favor  are  (1.)  the 
identity  of  its  ancient  name.  (2.)  The  distance  from  Haran 
eastwards,  which  agrees  better  than  that  of  the  other  three  situ¬ 
ations  with  the  indications  of  the  Sacred  narrative.  For  the 
authorities  in  its  behalf  see  Chwolson’s  Sabier ,  i.  313. 

2.  Warka ,  on  the  present  eastern  bank  of  the  Euphrates, 
above  the  junction  with  the  Tigris.  It  was  formerly  Warka. 
identified  with  Ur  by  Sir  H.  Rawlinson,  on  the  grounds  (1.) 
Of  Arabic  and  Talmudic  traditions,  of  which  he  gives  an  ex¬ 
ample  from  a  MS.  in  his  possession.2  (2.)  Of  the  likeness 
of  its  name  to  Orchoe ,  one  of  the  Grecian  forms  of  Ur. 
See  a  good  description  of  it  in  Loftus’s  Chaldoea  and  Susiana , 
163. 

3.  Mugheyr,  on  the  western  bank  of  the  Euphrates,  close  to 
the  confluence  of  the  Two  Rivers.  It  is  now  identified  Mugheyr. 
with  Ur  by  Sir  H.  Rawlinson,3  on  the  grounds  (1.)  Of  the 
name  of  Urukh  or  Hur ,  found  on  cylinders  in  the  neighborhood. 
(2.)  “  Of  the  remains  of  a  Temple  of  the  Moon,”  whence,  per¬ 
haps,  the  name  of  Camarina  given  to  Ur  by  Eupolemus.4  (3.) 


1  Journal  of  Geog.  Society,  xii.  481. 

2  Journal  of  Asiatic  Society ,  xii.  481. 


8  Athenaeum ,  Jan.  20,  1855,  pp.  84-95. 
4  Euseb.  Prcep.  Ev.  ix.  17. 


528 


HARAN. 


App.  I. 


Of  the  existence  of  a  district  called  Ibra ,  whence  he  derives  the 
name  of  Hebrew?-  To  these  arguments  may  be  added  the  appar¬ 
ent  identification,  by  Josephus,  of  Chaldsea  with  Babylonia;  — 
“  Terah  migrated  from  Chaldcea  into  Mesopotamia.”  2 

4.  Orfa  or  Urfa.  The  place  has  been  sufficiently  described 
Orfa.  in  Lecture  I.  p.  6. 

The  arguments  in  favor  of  its  identity  with  Ur  are  as  fol¬ 
lows  :  — 

a.)  it  is  on  the  eastern  side  of  the  Euphrates,  a  qualification 
of  Ur  required  not  only  by  the  usual  interpretation  of  the  word 
“  Hebrew,5’  but  by  Josh.  xxiv.  3,  “  beyond  the  river  whereas 
Mugheyr  now,  and  Warka  probably  in  ancient  times,3  was  on 
the  western  side. 

(2.)  The  general  tenor  of  the  narrative  closely  connects  Ur 
wfith  Haran  and  Aram.4  These  were  in  the  north-western  por¬ 
tion  of  Mesopotamia,  within  reach  of  Orfa. 

(3.)  Whatever  may  be  the  later  meanings  of  the  name  Chas- 
dim  or  Clialdceans ,  there  can  be  little  doubt  that  Arpha-Chesed 
(Arphaxad)  must  be  the  Arrapachitis  of  the  north,5  and  that  in 
this  connection,6  therefore,  the  Chasdim  spoken  of  must  be  in  the 
north.7 

(4.)  The  local  features  of  Orfa,  as  above  described,  are  guar¬ 
anties  for  its  remote  antiquity  as  a  city. 

(5.)  The  traditions  are  at  least  as  strong  as  those  elsewhere, 
which  may  have  originated  in  the  anxiety  of  the  Jewish  settle¬ 
ment  of  Babylonia  to  claim  the  possession  of  their  ancestor’s 
birthplace,  and  in  the  shifting  of  the  name  of  Chaldaea. 

II.  Where  was  Haran  ? 

Till  within  the  last  year,  the  identity  of  the  Patriarchal  Haran 
with  that  in  the  north  of  Mesopotamia  (indicated  in  Lecture  I. 
p.  9),  had  never  been  doubted. 

Within  the  last  twelve  months,  Dr.  Beke  (in  letters  to  the 
Haran.  “Athenasum”  8)  has  urged  the  claims  of  a  small  village, 

1  See  Loftus’s  Chaldcea  and  Susiana ,  p.  5  Ptol.  Geog.  vi.  1. 

131.  6  Gen.  xi.  10,  11,  28. 

2  Ant.  i.  6,  5.  7  Sec  Ewald,  Gesch.  i.  378. 

8  Loftus,  131.  8  Nov.  23,  1861;  Feb.  1,  15;  March  1, 

4  Gen.  xi.  27,  28,  31;  xii.  1-4.  29;  and  May  24,  1862. 


Arp.  I. 


H  All  AN. 


529 


called  j Hdrrdn-el-Awamid,  about  four  hours’  journey  east  of  Da¬ 
mascus,  on  the  western  border  of  the  lake  into  which  the  Barada 
and  the  Awaj  empty  themselves.  His  argument,  which  further 
requires  the  identification  of  Mesopotamia  ( Aram-Naharaim , 
Aram  of  the  Two  Rivers)  with  the  plain  of  Damascus  between 
the  Barada  and  the  Awaj,  is  based,  (1.)  on  the  identity  of  name, 
“  Haran  ;  ”  (2.)  on  the  supposed  likeness  of  natural  features, 
wells,  &c. ;  (3.)  on  the  journey  of  seven  days  taken  by  Laban 
between  Haran  and  Gilead ;  which,  though  suitable  for  a  jour¬ 
ney  from  Damascus  to  Gilead,  seems  too  short  a  time  for  a  jour¬ 
ney  of  350  miles  from  the  Euphrates.  The  first  and  second 
arguments  prove  nothing  more  for  the  Haran  of  Damascus  than 
for  that  of  Mesopotamia.  But  the  last  must  be  allowed  to  have 
its  weight.  No  doubt  the  natural  construction  of  the  passage  in 
Gen.  xxxi.  23,  is  (as  given  in  Lecture  I.  p.  10),  that  seven  days 
was  the  usual  time  consumed  in  the  journey.  But  in  the  face  of 
the  powerful  arguments  brought  by  Mr.  Porter,  Mr.  Ainsworth, 
and  Sir  Henry  Rawlinson,  in  favor  of  the  Mesopotamian  Haran,1 
this  single  expression  can  hardly  be  thought  to  turn  the  scale. 
The  number  may  be  a  round  number,  —  the  start  of  the  journey 
may  be  from  some  intermediate  spot,  —  or  the  dromedaries  of 
Laban  may  be  supposed  to  have  travelled  with  the  speed  of  “  the 
44  regular  Arab  post,  which  consumes  no  more  than  eight  days 
44  in  crossing  the  desert  from  Damascus  to  Baghdad,  a  distance 
44  of  nearly  500  miles.”  2  The  only  other  argument  which  might 
be  adduced  seems  to  me  to  be  that  Josephus,3  whilst  he  dwells 
much  on  Abraham’s  stay  at  Damascus,  does  not  mention  Haran. 
This  might  confirm  the  notion  that  Haran  and  Damascus  were 
virtually  in  the  same  region.  But  the  uniformity  of  tradition  in 
favor  of  the  Eastern  Haran,  the  absence  of  any  in  favor  of  the 
Western,  the  more  remarkable  from  the  abundance  of  other  pa¬ 
triarchal  and  Abrahamic  legends  in  the  neighborhood  of  Damas¬ 
cus —  the  difficulty  of  supposing  the  44  Aram-Naharaim  ”  of  the 
Hebrew  text  and  the  44  Mesopotamia  ”  of  the  LXX.  to  be  the 
country  of  the  Barada  and  Awaj,  and  44  the  river”  (“  the  JVa- 
Aar”)  of  Gen.  xxxi.  21,  to  have  other  than  its  usual  signification 

1  Athenaeum ,  Nov.  30;  Dec.  7,  1861;  2  Athenaeum,  April  19,  p.  530. 

March  22 ;  April  6, 19 ;  May  24,  1862.  8  Ant.  i.  7,  2. 

67 


\ 


530 


HARAN. 


App.  I. 


of  the  Euphrates  —  are,  it  appears  to  me,  almost  decisive  in  favor 
of  the  old  interpretation. 

I  subjoin  a  narrative  of  an  excursion  taken  by  the  Rev.  S. 
Robson  (the  excellent  Protestant  Missionary  at  Damascus)  to 
Harran-el-Awamid,  in  the  spring  of  this  year,  at  my  request,  to 
examine  the  columns  which  remain  on  the  spot,  and  which  have 
given  it  its  present  name. 

“  Last  month,  Mr.  Sandwith,  Mr.  Crawford,  and  I  went  to 
“  Harran-el-Awamid.  We  started  at  five  o’clock  in  the  morn- 
“  ing,  and  rode  there  at  a  walking  pace  in  four  hours  and  a  quar- 
“  ter.  We  returned  to  the  city  in  the  evening. 

“We  could  not  form  an  opinion  as  to  the  kind  or  the  form  of 
“  the  building,  to  which  the  three  columns  now  standing  had  be- 
“  longed.  In  different  parts  of  the  village  there  are  pieces  of 
“  columns  of  the  same  black  stone,  but  of  small  diameters,  and 
there  are  large  dressed  stones  of  the  same  material,  which  evi¬ 
dently  were  in  ancient  buildings.  The  first  house,  in  the  west 
“  of  the  village,  iis  the  Mosque.  Attached  to  it  is  a  large  yard, 
“  in  which  is  a  well,  with  two  or  three  stone  troughs,  used  for 
“  ablutions.  The  well  and  the  troughs  are  in  a  small  building, 
“  and  here  is  the  Greek  inscription.  It  is  on  a  piece  of  a  column 
“  five  or  six  feet  long,  and  fourteen  or  fifteen  inches  in  diameter. 


tt 


u 


(t 


u 


It  lies  horizontally,  in  the  angle  between  the  wall  and  the 
ground,  —  one  side  a  little  in  the  wall,  and  another  a  little  in 
“  the  ground.  The  beginnings  of  the  lines  of  the  inscription  are 
“  visible,  but  the  ends  are  on  the  lower  side  of  the  stone  in  the 
ground.  Apparently  there  had  been  four  lines.  The  whole 
is  greatly  worn  and  defaced,  but  several  letters  in  the  first  line, 
“  and  two  in  the  second,  are  legible  as  below  :  — 

AAUA  (CONSn  .... 

.  A  .  O  .  .... 


u 


u 


“  The  mark  (between  A  and  C  in  the  first  line)  I  do  not  un- 
“  derstand,  and  the  II  was  doubtful  to  us.  We  could  not  guess 
“  at  a  single  letter  in  the  third  and  fourth  lines.  The  inscription 
“  had  not  been  carefully  cut ;  the  letters  were  not  well  formed, 
“  nor  of  the  same  size,  and  the  lines  were  not  quite  straight. 


Arp.  I. 


HARAN. 


531 


“  The  people  showed  great  unwillingness  to  have  the  stone 
“  moved.  The  inscription  is  so  much  defaced,  that  we  could  not 
44  read  even  the  first  line  as  far  as  it  is  exposed,  and  it  seemed 
“  most  likely  that,  if  the  whole  were  uncovered,  we  would  find 
44  hardly  another  letter  legible.  I  confess  also  that  I  doubted 
44  much  whether  the  inscription  would  prove  of  any  consequence 
44  if  we  had  the  whole  of  it.  The  result  w^as  that  we  gave  up 
44  our  design  of  moving  the  stone.  The  water  in  the  well  stood 
u  only  five  or  six  feet  below  the  surface  of  the  ground,  and  the 
44  supply  is  evidently  abundant.  It  is  used  chiefly  for  ablutions 
44  and  for  drinking,  by  the  people  when  in  the  Mosque,  but 
44  never  for  watering  cattle.  It  tasted  to  us  slightly  brackish. 
46  There  is  another  well  outside  the  yard  of  the  Mosque.  The 
44  water  in  it  was  only  two  or  three  feet  below  the  surface  of  the 
“  ground,  but  it  is  stagnant,  and  is  never  used  now  for  any 
44  purpose.  There  are  no  wells  in  or  around  the  village  except 
44  these  two. 

44  The  whole  region  is  remarkably  level,  and  is  well  cultivated. 
44  There  were  very  large  fields  of  wheat  all  around.  I  do  not 
44  know  that  any  land  near  the  village  is  now  used  only  for  past- 
44  ure.  There  is  an  abundance  of  water  for  irrigation  and  other 
44  purposes.  The  cattle  drink  from  ponds,  of  which  there  are 
44  several  near  the  village.  Water  for  drinking  and  cooking  is 
44  taken  from  what  the  people  call  4  the  river,’  an  artificial  stream 
44  constructed  in  the  mode  described  in  Porter’s  ‘  Five  Years  in 
“  Damascus.’  The  Barada  is  distant  more  than  half  an  hour  to 
“  the  north,  and  the  lakes  some  two  hours  to  the  east.  Proba- 
“  bly  the  artificial  river  did  not  exist  in  the  time  of  Rebekah,  but 
“  the  water,  now  abundant  on  or  near  the  surface  of  the  ground, 
44  was  perhaps  even  more  so  then.  But  the  Harran  near  Orfa 
44  in  Mesopotamia  has  also,  it  is  said,  an  abundant  supply  of  water 
“  from  several  small  streams  near  it. 

44  Is  it  in  the  least  probable  that  the  Greek  inscription  could 
44  throw  any  light  on  the  question  about  this  place  ?  At  most  it 
44  could  only  give  an  ancient  tradition,  and  if  such  a  tradition  ever 
44  existed,  how  have  all  traces  of  it  disappeared  from  books  and 
44  from  among  the  people  ?  Do  not  the  traditions  of  Jews,  Mos- 
14  lems,  and  Christians  point  to  one  place  in  the  region  between 


532 


TRADITIONS  OF  ABRAHAM. 


App.  L 


“  the  Euphrates  and  Tigris  still  called  Mesopotamia  (‘  between 
44  the  rivers,’  bein-en-naharein )  in  Arabic,  as  it  appears  to  have 
44  been  called  in  Hebrew. 

44  The  name  Harran  has  not  a  form  usual  in  Arabic,  and  na- 
“  tive  scholars  tell  me  the  name  is  not  Arabic.  Harrdn ,  the 
44  Arabic  name  of  the  town  beyond  the  Euphrates,  has  an  Ara- 
44  bic  form  as  if  from  harr ,  heat,  and  may  mean  a  hot  or  burned 
44  place.”  1 

For  the  whole  history  of  the  Mesopotamian  Haran,  see  the 
learned  chapter  in  Chwolson’s  Sabier ,  Book  I.  ch.  x.  —  Hdrran 
und  die  Hdrranier. 

III.  The  Place  of  Abraham ,  at  Birzeh  near  Damascus. 

44  The  name  of  Abraham  is  still  famous  at  Damascus,  and 
Birzeh.  44  there  is  shown  a  village  named  from  him  called 
44  4  the  habitation  of  Abraham  ’  ”  (obc^o-is  ’Afipafiov').  So  Jose¬ 
phus2  concludes  a  quotation  from  the  lost  work  of  Nicolaus  of 
Damascus,  whether  in  his  own  words,  or  those  of  Nicolaus,  does 
not  appear.  Mr.  Porter  3  first  called  attention  to  this  passage  in 
connection  with  the  fact  that  44  in  the  village  of  Birzeh,  one  hour 
44  north  of  Damascus,  there  is  a  chapel  known  by  the  name  of 
44  the  Patriarch,  Mesjid  Ibrahim ,  held  in  high  veneration  by  the 
44  Moslems.  Pilgrimages  are  made  to  it  at  a  certain  season 
44  every  year,”  at  which  takes  place  a  miraculous  procession 
—  like  that  of  the  Doseh  at  Cairo  —  of  a  Dervish  riding  over 
the  bodies  of  his  followers.  He  adds  that  Ibn  ’Asaker  (in  his 
history  of  Damascus,  written  before  the  sixth  century  of  the 
Hejra)  gives  a  long  account  of  it,  and  says,  that  44  here  Abraham 
44  worshipped  God,  when  he  turned  back  from  the  pursuit  of 
44  the  kings  who  had  plundered  Sodom,  and  had  carried  away 
44  Lot.” 

In  consequence  of  this  notice,  I  visited  the  spot  in  the  spring 
of  1862.  The  village  lies  at  the  entrance  of  the  defile  which 
penetrates  into  the  hills  at  the  N.W.  corner  of  the  Damascus 

1  Dr.  Beke  has  since  communicated  an  boundary  of  Palestine,  is  well  worthy  of 
account  of  his  journey  to  Harran-el-Awa-  notice, 
mid  to  the  Geographical  Society.  His  de-  2  Ant.  i.  7,  §  2. 

script  ion  of  the  strongly  marked  character  3  Five  Years  in  Damascus ,  i.  82. 

of  the  hills  of  Gilead,  as  the  easternmost 


App.  I. 


BIRZEH. 


533 


plain  on  the  road  to  Helbon.  Through  the  defile  rushes  out  a 
rivulet  lined  with  verdure.  A  large  walnut-tree  stands  in  front 
of  the  irregular  homely  mosque  which  is  built  on  the  craggy  side 
of  the  barren  range.  Its  upper  story  is  occupied  by  the  cham¬ 
ber  opening  into  the  sacred  cavern  ;  its  lower  story  serves  for 
the  accommodation  of  pilgrims.  I  subjoin  the  account  of  it,  and 
of  the  legend  attached  to  it,  from  a  letter  of  Mr.  Robson,  who 
afterwards  kindly  explored  the  mosque  for  me  in  detail :  — 

“We  crossed  a  very  small  court,  and  entered  a  very  plain 
“  mosque  about  thirty  feet  long  and  eighteen  or  twenty  feet  wide. 
“  It  stands  against  the  side  of  the  mountain,  and  the  north  part 
“  of  the  west  wall  is  partly  formed  of  the  native  rock.  At  that 
“  part  is  a  small  square  gallery  from  which  we  walked  into  a 
“  narrow  crooked  passage  in  the  rock.  It  is  a  natural  cleft 
“  from  two  to  three  feet  wide,  and  extending  twelve  or  fifteen 
“  feet  into  the  hill.  At  the  end  of  it,  where  it  is  quite  dark, 
“  there  is  some  reddish  clay,  which  is  regarded  as  peculiarly 
“  sacred,  and  visitors  usually  carry  away  a  little  of  it.  There 
“  were  inscriptions  on  the  walls  of  the  mosque  of  the  kind  usu- 
“  ally  found  in  such  places. 

“  The  legend  I  shall  briefly  give  as  we  heard  it  on  the  spot. 
“  Nimrod  was  warned  that  a  child  to  be  born  and  to  be  named 
“  Abraham  would  overthrow  his  power,  and  he  ordered  his 
“  Wezeer  to  cause  all  women  with  child  in  his  dominions  to  be 
“  seized  and  the  infants  destroyed.  The  Wezeer’s  daughter  was 
“  married  to  Abraham’s  father,  and  he  desired  his  son-in-law  to 
“  take  care  that  his  wife  did  not  become  pregnant.  She  became 
“  pregnant  notwithstanding,  but  she  successfully  concealed  her 
“  state  from  her  father  and  every  one.  When  the  time  of  her 
“  delivery  came  she  fled  from  her  home  in  Bethlehem,  and  wan- 
“  dered  on  till  she  came  to  Birzeh,  when  the  cleft  we  saw  opened 
“  before  her,  and  she  entered  and  Abraham  was  born.  It  was 
“  then  that  the  clay  was  tinged  red.  Fearing  Nimrod,  she  con- 
“  cealed  the  infant  in  the  hole  for  a  long  time,  coming  occasion- 
“  ally  from  Bethlehem  to  nurse  him. 

“  This  story  seems  to  be  implicitly  believed  by  the  attendants 
“  and  visitors  at  the  mosque,  the  villagers,  and  the  common  peo- 
“  pie  of  the  city.  It  is,  however,  only  a  vulgar  legend.  Liter- 


534 


TRADITIONS  OF  ABRAHAM. 


Apr.  I. 


“  ary  Moslems  disavow  it.  With  them  the  Makam  Ibrahim  is 
“  simply  a  Mesjid  to  Ibrahim,  —  a  mosque  or  place  of  worship 
“  sacred  or  consecrated  to  Abraham.  This  is  all  the  learned  say 
“  of  the  place.  I  lately  saw  an  Arabic  MS.  account  of  the 
“  Moslem  holy  places  in  Syria,  composed  by  a  man  who  was 
“judge  (kady)  of  Erzeroum,  two  or  three  hundred  years  ago. 
“  In  this  book  the  place  at  Birzeh  is  described  just  as  I  have 
“  stated  above.  Neither  in  it,  nor  in  conversation,  have  I  found 
“  any  reason  assigned  for  the  connection  of  the  name  of  the  pa- 
“  triarch  with  the  place,  nor  any  tradition  of  his  having  ever 
“  visited  it. 

“  Learned  Moslems  are  very  strict  and  critical  in  judging  the 
“  claims  of  sacred  graves  and  other  holy  places.  For  instance, 
“  the  grave  of  Mohammed  is  attested  by  a  series  of  legal  doc- 
“  uments,  a  new  one  being  drawn  up  every  year ;  and  this  is 
“  the  only  grave  of  a  prophet  which  they  will  admit  to  be  cer- 
“  tainly  known.  Even  the  graves  of  the  patriarchs  at  Hebron 
“  are  regarded  as  only  the  supposed  and  probable  resting-places 
“  of  those  whose  name  they  bear.” 


App.  II. 


THE  CAVE  OF .  MACHPEL AH. 


535 


APPENDIX  II. 

THE  CAVE  OF  MACHPELAH. 


In  my  Lecture  on  the  History  of  Abraham  (p.  37)  I  en¬ 
larged  on  the  extraordinary  interest  attached  to  the  Cave  of 
Machpelah.  At  that  time  I  little  thought  that  I  should  ever 
be  enabled  to  penetrate  within  the  inaccessible  sanctuary  which 
surrounds  it.  This  privilege  I  owe  to  the  effort  made  by  His 
Royal  Highness  the  Prince  of  Wales,  in  1862,  to  obtain  an 
entrance  into  the  Mosque  of  Hebron  ;  the  success  of  which 
gave  to  his  Eastern  journey  a  peculiar  value,  such  as  has  at¬ 
tached  to  the  visit  of  no  other  European  Prince  to  the  Holy 
Land. 

The  Cave  of  Machpelah  is  described  in  the  Book  of  Genesis 
with  a  particularity  almost  resembling  that  of  a  legal  The 
deed.  The  name  of  “  Machpelah,”  or  rather  “  the  of  Mach- 
Machpelah,”  appears  to  have  belonged  to  the  whole  pelah‘ 
district  or  property,1  though  it  is  applied  sometimes  to  the  cave,2 
and  sometimes  to  the  field.3  The  meaning  of  the  word  is  quite 
uncertain,  though  that  of  “  double,” 4  which  is  adopted  in  all 
the  ancient  versions  (almost  always  as  if  applied  to  the  cave)  is 
the  most  probable.  In  this  “  Machpelah  ”  was  afield,  “  a  culti¬ 
vated  field,”  which  belonged  not  to  one  of  the  Amorite  chiefs  — 
Aner,  Eshcol,  or  Mamre,  but  to  a  Hittite,  Ephron  the  son  of 
Zohar.5  The  field  was  planted,  as  most  of  those  around  the 
vale  of  Hebron,  with  trees  :  olives,  terebinths,  or  ilexes.  At 
one  “  end,”  6  probably  the  upper  end,  was  a  cave.  The  whole 


1  Gen.  xxm.  17.  “  The  field  of  Ephron, 
which  was  in  Machpelah.” 

2  Ibid.  9;  ^xv.  9.  “  The  cave  of  (the) 
Machpelah.” 

3  Ibid.  19;  xlix.  30;  1.  13.  “The  field 

)f  (the)  Machpelah.” 


4  “  Spelunca  duplex,”  Vulgate,  to  otzt]- 
Ticuov,  to  SlitAovv,  LXX.  passim.  Syriac, 
passim ,  except  in  Gen.  1.  13,  where  it  is 
rendered  “  the  double  field.” 

5  Gen.  xxiii.  8;  xxv.  9. 

3  Gen.  xxiii.  9. 


536 


THE  CAVE  OF  MACHPELAH. 


App.  II 


place  was  “  in  the  face  of  Mamre,” 1  that  is,  as  it  would  seem, 
opposite  the  oaks  or  terebinths  of  Mainre,  the  Amorite,  where 
Abraham  had  pitched  his  tent.  In  this  case,  it  would  be  im¬ 
mediately  within  view  of  his  encampment ;  and  the  open  mouth 
of  the  cave  must  be  supposed  to  have  attracted  his  attention  long 
before  he  made  the  proposal  which  ended  in  his  purchase  of  this, 
his  first  and  only  property  in  the  Holy  Land.  “  There  they 
“  buried  Abraham  and  Sarah  his  wife ;  there  they  buried  Isaac 
u  and  Rebekali  his  wife;  and  there,”  according  to  the  dying 
speech  of  the  last  of  the  Patriarchs,  “  Jacob  buried  Leah  ;  ” 
and  there  he  himself  was  buried2  “  in  the  cave  of  the  field  of 
“  Maclipelah,  which  Abraham  bought  for  a  possession  of  a  burial- 
“  place  from  Ephron  the  Hittite  before  Mamre.”  3 

This  is  the  last  Biblical  notice  of  the  Cave  of  Machpelah.  It 
is  remarkable  that  after  the  close  of  the  Book  of  Genesis  no 
mention  is  made  of  it  in  the  Scriptures.  Even  in  the  New  Tes¬ 
tament,  by  a  singular  variation,  in  the  speech  of  Stephen,4  the 
tomb  at  Shechem  is  substituted  for  it.  It  is  not  even  mentioned 
in  the  account  of  Caleb’s  conquest  of  Hebron,  nor  of  David’s 
reign  there.  The  only  possible  allusion  is  the  statement  in  Ab¬ 
salom’s  life,  that  he  had  vowed  a  pilgrimage  to  Hebron.5 

But  the  formal  and  constant  allusion  to  it  in  the  Book  of  Gen¬ 
esis  is  a  sufficient  guaranty  not  only  for  a  spot  of  that  name  hav¬ 
ing  existed  from  early  times,  but  also  for  its  having  been  known 
at  the  time  of  the  composition,  and  of  the  introduction  of  the 
Book  into  the  Jewish  Canon.  That  cannot  be  earlier,  on  any 
hypothesis,  than  the  time  of  Moses,  nor  later  than  the  times  of 
the  Monarchy. 

We  are  not  left,  however,  entirely  in  the  dark.  Josephus,  in 
The  En-  his  “  Antiquities,”  tells  us  that  there  were  “  monuments 
closure.  built  there  by  Abraham  and  his  descendants  ;  ”  6  and 


1  This  interpretation  of  the  words  “  be¬ 
fore  ”  or  “  in  the  face  of”  Mamre,  would 
require  that  Mamre  should  be  on  the  hill 
immediately  to  the  south  of  the  modern 
town  of  Hebron.  It  must  be  remembered 
that  such  a  position  is  inconsistent  with  the 
traditional  locality  either  of  the  existing 
“oak”  of  Abraham,  or  (what  is  more  im¬ 
portant)  of  the  place  of  the  sacred  “  tere¬ 


binth  ”  worshipped  as  the  spot  of  his  en¬ 
campment,  five  miles  to  the  north  of  He¬ 
bron.  The  Vulgate  translates  the  words, 
“  e  regione .” 

2  Gen.  xlix.  30. 

3  Ibid.  1.  13. 

4  Acts  vii.  16. 

6  2  Sam.  xv.  7. 

6  Ant.  i.  14. 


App.  II. 


THE  ENCLOSURE. 


537 


in  his  “Jewish  War,”  that  “  the  monuments  of  Abraham  and 
his  sons  ”  (apparently  alluding  to  those  already  mentioned  in  the 
Antiquities)  “  were  still  shown  at  Hebron,  of  beautiful  marble, 
and  admirably  worked.”1  These  monuments2  can  hardly  be 
other  than  what  the  “  Bourdeaux  Pilgrim,”  in  a.  d.  333,  de¬ 
scribes  as  “  a  quadrangle  of  stones  of  astonishing  beauty ;  ”  and 
these  again  are  clearly  those  which  exist  at  the  present  day,  — 
the  massive  enclosure  of  the  Mosque.  The  tradition,  thus  carried 
up  unquestionably  to  the  age  of  Josephus,  is  in  fact  carried  by 
the  same  argument  much  higher.  For  the  walls,  as  they  now 
stand,  and  as  Josephus  speaks  of  them,  must  have  been  built 
before  his  time.  The  terms  which  he  uses  imply  this,  and  he 
omits  to  mention  them  amongst  the  works  of  Herod  the  Great, 
the  only  potentate  who  could  or  would  have  built  them  in  his 
time,  and  amongst  whose  buildings  they  must  have  occupied,  if 
at  all,  a  distinguished  place.  But,  if  not  erected  by  Herod,  there 
is  then  no  period  at  which  we  can  stop  short  of  the  Monarchy. 
So  elaborate  and  costly  a  structure  is  inconceivable  in  the  dis¬ 
turbed  and  impoverished  state  of  the  nation  after  the  Return.  It 
is  to  the  kings,  at  least,  that  the  walls  must  be  referred,  and,  if 
so,  to  none  so  likely  as  the  sovereigns  to  whom  they  are  ascribed 
by  Jewish  and  Mussulman 3  tradition,  —  David  or  Solomon. 
Beyond  this  we  can  hardly  expect  to  find  a  continuous  proof. 
But  by  this  time,  we  have  almost  joined  the  earlier  tradition  im¬ 
plied  in  the  reception  of  the  Book  of  Genesis,  with  its  detailed 
local  description,  into  the  Jewish  Sacred  Books. 

With  this  early  origin  of  the  present  enclosure  its  appearance4 


1  B.  J.  iv.  9,  §  7. 

2  For  the  later  list  of  witnesses  see  Rob¬ 
inson’s  B.  It.  ii.  77,  78. 

3  The  Mussulman  name  at  the  present 
day  for  the  enclosure  is  “  the  wall  of  Solo¬ 
mon.” 

4  The  peculiarities  of  the  masonry  are 
these:  —  (1.)  Some  of  the  stones  are  very 
large;  Dr.  Wilson  mentions  one  38  feet 
long,  and  3  feet  4  inches  deep  ;  others  are 
16  feet  long,  and  5  feet  high.  The  largest 
in  the  Haram  wall  at  Jerusalem  is  24)  feet. 
But  yet  (2.)  the  surface,  in  splendid  preser¬ 
vation,  is  very  finely  worked,  more  so  than 
the  finest  of  the  stones  at  the  south  and 

68 


south-west  portion  of  the  enclosure  at 
Jerusalem;  the  sunken  part  round  the 
edges  (sometimes  called  the  “bevel”) 
very  shallow,  with  no  resemblance  at  all  to 
more  modern  “  rustic  work.”  (3.)  The  cross 
joints  are  not  always  vertical,  but  some 
are  oblique.  (4.)  The  wall  is  divided  by 
pilasters  about  2  feet  6  inches  wide,  and  5 
feet  apart,  running  the  entire  height  of  the 
ancient  wall.  There  are  eight  of  these 
pilasters  at  the  ends,  and  sixteen  at  the 
sides  of  the  enclosure.  These  observations 
are  taken  partly  from  Mr.  Grove,  who 
visited  Hebron  in  1859,  partly  from  Dr. 
Robinson  ( B .  R.  ii.  75,  76).  The  length 


538 


THE  CAYE  OF  MACHPELAH. 


App.  II. 


fully  agrees.  With  the  long  continuity  of  the  tradition  agrees 
also  the  general  character  of  Hebron  and  its  vicinity.  There  is 
no  spot  in  Palestine,  except,  perhaps,  Mount  Gerizim,  where  the 
genius  loci  has  been  so  slightly  disturbed  in  the  lapse  of  centu¬ 
ries.  There  is  already  a  savor  of  antiquity  in  the  earliest  men¬ 
tion  of  Hebron,  “  built  seven  years  before  Zoan  in  Egypt.”  1  In 
it  the  names  of  the  Amorite  inhabitants  were  preserved2  long 
after  they  had  perished  elsewhere ;  and  from  the  time  that  the 
memory  of  Abraham  first  begun  to  be  cherished  there  it  seems 
never  to  have  ceased.  The  oak,  the  “  antediluvian  oak,”  3  “  the 
Terebinth  as  old  as  the  Creation,”  4  were  shown  in  the  time  of 
Josephus.  The  Terebinth  gave  to  the  spot  where  it  stood  the 
name  which  lingers  there  down  to  the  present  day,5  centuries 
after  the  tree  itself  has  disappeared.  The  fair  held  beneath  it, 
the  worship  offered,  shows  that  the  Patriarch  was  regarded  al¬ 
most  as  a  Divinity.  His  name  became  identified  not  only  with 
the  sepulchral  quadrangle,  “  The  Castle  of  Abraham,”  but  with 
the  whole  place.  The  Mussulman  name  of  “  El-khalil,”  “  The 
Friend”  (of  God),  has  as  completely  superseded  in  the  native 
population  the  Israelite  name  of  “  Hebron,”  as  the  name  of 
“  Hebron  ”  had  already  superseded  the  Canaanite  name  of 
“  Kirjath-arba.”  The  town  itself,  which  in  ancient  times  must 
have  been  at  some  distance  (as  is  implied  in  the  original  account 
of  the  purchase  of  the  burial-place)  from  the  sepulchre,  has  de¬ 
scended  from  the  higher  ground  on  which  it  was  formerly  situ¬ 
ated,  and  clustered  round  the  tomb  which  had  become  the  chief 
centre  of  attraction.  A  similar  instance  may  be  noted  in  the 
name  of  El-Lazarieh,  applied  to  Bethany,  from  the  reputed 
tomb  of  Lazarus,  round  which  the  modern  village  has  gathered. 
In  our  own  country  a  parallel  may  be  observed  at  St.  Alban’s. 
The  town  of  Verulam  has  crossed  the  river  from  the  northern 
bank  on  which  it  formerly  stood,  and  has  climbed  the  southern 


and  breadth  are  given  by  Dr.  Robinson 
respectively  at  200  and  150  feet,  by  Signor 
Pierotti  at  1981  and  113!  feet,  who  also 
makes  the  ancient  wall  48  feet  high,  and 
6t  feet  thick. 

1  Num.  xiii.  22. 

2  Judg.  i.  10. 

3  Ant.  i.  10,  §  4,  T7]V  ’Slyvyrjv  KakovfievTjv 


dpiiv.  Dr.  Rosen  conjectures  that  this  is 
the  oak  still  shown  under  the  name  of 
Sibteh. 

4  B.  J.  iv.  9,  §  7. 

5  The  field  immediately  north-east  of 
the  building  called  Ramet-el-Khalil  is 
known  by  the  name  of  the  “  Halkath-el- 
Butm,”  “  Field  of  the  Terebinth.” 


app.  n. 


THE  VISIT  OF  THE  PRINCE  OF  WALES. 


539 


hill  in  order  to  enclose  the  grave  of  S.  Alban,  whose  name, 
in  like  manner,  has  entirely  superseded  that  of  the  original 
Verulam. 

For  the  sake  of  this  sacred  association,  the  town  has  become 
one  of  the  Four  Holy  Places  of  Islam  and  of  Judaism,  —  the 

t/  7 

other  three  in  the  sacred  group  being,  in  the  case  of  Islam, 
Mecca,  Medinah,  and  Jerusalem;  in  the  case  of  Judaism,  Jeru¬ 
salem,  Safed,  and  Tiberias.  The  Mosque  is  said  to  have  been 
founded  and  adorned  in  the  successive  reigns  of  Sultan  Kelaoun, 
and  of  his  son  Naser-Mohammed,  in  the  thirteenth  and  four¬ 
teenth  centuries.  Its  property  consists  of  some  of  the  best  land 
in  the  plains,  of  Sharon  and  Philistia. 

But  of  all  the  proofs  of  the  sanctity  of  the  place  the  most  re¬ 
markable  is  the  impenetrable  mystery  in  which  the  sanctuary 
has  been  involved,  being  in  fact  a  living  witness  of  the  unbroken 
local  veneration  with  which  the  three  religions  of  Jew,  Christian, 
and  Mussulman  have  honored  the  great  Patriarch.  The  stones 
of  the  enclosure  have,  as  has  been  said,  been  noticed  from  the 
time  of  Josephus  downwards.  The  long  roof  of  the  Mosque, 
the  upper  part  of  its  windows,  the  two  minarets  at  the  south¬ 
west  and  north-east  corners  rising  above  the  earlier  and  later 
walls  of  the  enclosure,  have  been  long  familiar  to  travellers. 
But  what  lay  within  had,  till  within  the  present  year,  been  a 
matter  if  not  of  total  ignorance,  yet  of  uncertainty  more  pro¬ 
voking  than  ignorance  itself.  There  were  confused  accounts 1  of 
an  early  Christian  Church,  of  a  subsequent  mosque,  of  the  cave 
and  its  situation,  which  transpired  through  widely  contradictory 
statements  of  occasional  Jewish  and  Christian  pilgrims,  Antoni¬ 
nus,  Arculf,  and  Ssewulf,  Benjamin  of  Tudela,  and  Maundeville. 
For  the  six  hundred  years  since  the  Mussulman  occupation,  in 
A.  D.  1187,  no  European,  except  by  stealth,  was  known  to  have 
set  foot  within  the  sacred  precincts.  Three  accounts  alone  of 
such  visits  have  been  given  in  modern  times ;  one,  extremely 
brief  and  confused,  by  Giovanni  Finati,  an  Italian  servant  of 
Mr.  Bankes,  who  entered  as  a  Mussulman ; 2  a  second,  by  an 
English  clergyman,  Mr.  Monro,  who,  however,  does  not  profess 

1  Of  these  there  is  a  collection  in  the  Egypt,  published  by  the  Oriental  Transla- 
Appendix  to  Quatremere’s  Translation  of  tion  Fund,  vol.  i.  part  ii.  pp.  239-242. 
the  History  of  the  Mamelook  Sultans  of  2  Travels  of  Finati,  1830,  ii.  236. 


§40 


THE  CAYE  OF  MACHPELAH. 


App.  II. 


to  speak  from  his  own  testimony ; 1  a  third,  by  far  the  most  dis¬ 
tinct,  by  the  Spanish  renegade  Badia,  or  “  Ali  Bey.”2  While 
the  other  sacred  places  in  Palestine  —  the  Mosque  at  Jerusalem, 
within  the  last  ten  years,  the  Mosque  of  Damascus,  within  the 
last  two  years  —  have  been  thrown  open,  at  least  to  distinguished 
travellers,  the  Mosque  of  Hebron  still  remained,  even  to  royal 
personages,  hermetically  sealed. 

To  break  through  this  mystery,  to  clear  up  this  uncertainty, 
even  irrespectively  of  the  extraordinary  interest  attaching  to 
the  spot,  was  felt  by  those  most  concerned,  to  be  an  object  not 
unworthy  of  the  first  visit  of  a  Prince  of  Wales  to  the  Holy 
Land. 

From  the  moment  that  the  expedition  was  definitively  arranged 
The  Visit  in  January,  1862,  it  was  determined  by  His  Royal 
Prince  of  Highness  and  his  advisers,  that  the  attempt  should  be 
Wales.  made,  if  it  were  found  compatible  with  prudence,  and 
with  the  respect  due  to  the  religious  feelings  of  the  native  popula¬ 
tion.  On  arriving  at  Jerusalem,  the  first  inquiry  was,  as  to  the 
possibility  of  accomplishing  this  long-cherished  design.  Mr. 
Finn,  the  English  Consul,  had  already  prepared  the  way,  by  re¬ 
questing  a  Firman  from  the  Porte  for  this  purpose.  The  Gov¬ 
ernment  at  Constantinople,  aware  of  the  susceptible  fanaticism 
of  the  population  of  Hebron,  sent,  instead  of  a  direct  order,  a 
Vizierial  letter  of  recommendation  to  the  Governor  of  Jerusalem, 
leaving  in  fact  the  whole  matter  to  his  discretion.  The  Governor, 
Suraya  Pasha,  —  partly  from  the  natural  difficulties  of  the  pro¬ 
posed  attempt,  partly,  it  may  be,  from  his  own  personal  feeling  on 
the  subject,  —  held  out  long  and  strenuously  against  taking  upon 
himself  the  responsibility  of  a  step  which  had  hitherto  no  prece¬ 
dent.  Even  as  lately  as  the  preceding  year,  he  had  resisted  the 
earnest  entreaty  of  a  distinguished  French  scholar  and  antiquary, 
though  armed  with  the  recommendations  of  his  own  government 
and  of  Fuad  Pasha,  then  Turkish  Commissioner  in  Syria.  The 
negotiation  devolved  on  General  Bruce,  the  Governor  of  the 
Prince  of  Wales,  assisted  bv  the  interpreter  of  the  party,  Mr. 
Noel  Moore,  son  of  the  Consul-General  of  Beyrut.  It  may 

1  Summer  Ramble  in  Syria ,  1835,  i.  242.  2  Travels  of  Ali  Bey  (1803-1807),  ii. 

232. 


App.  II. 


THE  VISIT  OF  THE  PRINCE  OF  WALES. 


541 


truly  be  said,  —  as  it  was  in  enumerating  the  qualifications  of  the 
lamented  General  after  his  death,  —  that  the  tact  and  firmness 
which  he  showed  on  this  occasion  were  worthy  of  the  first  ranks 
of  diplomacy.  Many  grave  political  difficulties  might,  in  other 
and  grander  spheres,  have  been  unlocked  by  the  dexterity  with 
which  he  forced  open  the  Mosque  of  Hebron. 

Suraya  Pasha  offered  every  other  civility  or  honor  that  could 
be  paid.  The  General  took  his  position  on  the  ground,  that 
since  the  opening  of  the  other  Holy  Places,  this  was  the  one 
honor  left  for  the  Turkish  Government  to  award  to  the  rare  priv¬ 
ilege  of  a  visit  of  the  Prince  of  Wales.  He  urged,  too,  the 
feeling  with  which  the  request  was  made  :  that  we,  as  well  as 
they,  had  a  common  interest  in  the  Patriarchs  common  to  both 
Religions ;  and  that  nothing  was  claimed  beyond  what  would 
be  accorded  to  Mussulmans  themselves.  At  last  the  Pasha  ap¬ 
peared  to  give  way.  But  a  new  alarm  arising  out  of  a  visit  of 
the  Royal  party  to  the  shrine  commonly  called  the  Tomb  of 
David,  in  Jerusalem,  complicated  the  question  again,  and  the 
Pasha  finally  declared  that  the  responsibility  was  too  serious,  and 
that,  unless  the  General  actually  insisted  upon  it,  he  could  not 
undertake  to  guarantee  the  Prince’s  safety  from  the  anger  either 
of  the  population  or  of  the  Patriarchs  themselves.  “  So  strong 
“  is  our  sentiment  on  this  subject,”  he  said,  “  that,  when  some 
“  time  ago  the  Prophet’s  Tomb  at  Medina  needed  repairs,  and 
“  a  recompense  was  offered  to  any  one  who  would  undertake  the 
“  repairs,  a  man  was  with  difficulty  found  for  the  task  ;  he  went 
“  in,  he  performed  his  work,  he  returned,  —  and  was  immediately 
u  put  to  death :  that  was  considered  to  be  the  only  adequate  rec- 
“  ompense  for  so  sacrilegious  an  errand.”  It  was  an  anxious 
moment  for  the  Prince’s  advisers.  On  the  one  hand,  there  was 
the  doubt,  now  seriously  raised,  as  to  the  personal  safety  of  the 
attempt,  which,  though  it  hardly  entered  into  the  Prince's  own 
calculation,  was  a  paramount  question  for  those  who  were  charged 
with  the  responsibility  of  the  step.  On  the  other  hand,  the 
point  having  been  once  raised,  could  not  be  lightly  laid  aside ; 
the  more  so,  as  it  was  strongly  felt  that  to  allow  of  a  refusal  in 
the  case  of  the  Prince  of  Wales,  would  establish  an  impregnable 
precedent  against  future  relaxations,  and  close  the  doors  of  the 


542 


THE  CAYE  OF  MACHPELAH. 


App.  H. 


Mosque  more  firmly  than  ever  against  all  inquirers.  General 
Bruce  adopted  a  course  which  ultimately  proved  successful.  He 
announced  to  the  Pasha  the  extreme  displeasure  of  the  Prince  at 
the  refusal,  and  declared  his  intention  of  leaving  Jerusalem  in¬ 
stantly  for  the  Dead  Sea  ;  adding  that,  if  the  sanctuary  at  He¬ 
bron  could  not  be  entered,  the  Prince  would  decline  to  visit 
Hebron  altogether.  We  started  immediately  on  a  three  days’ 
expedition.  On  the  evening  of  the  first  day,  it  was  found  that 
the  Pasha  had  followed  us.  He  sent  to  reopen  the  negotiations, 
and  offered  to  make  the  attempt,  if  the  numbers  were  limited 
to  the  Prince  and  two  or  three  of  the  suite,  promising  to  go  him¬ 
self  to  Hebron  to  prepare  for  the  event.  This  proposal  was 
guardedly,  but  decisively  accepted.  And  accordingly,  on  our 
return  to  Jerusalem,  instead  of  going  northwards  immediately, 
the  plan  was  laid  for  the  enterprise. 

It  was  early  on  the  morning  of  Monday,  the  Tth  of  April,  that 
we  left  our  encampment,  and  moved  in  a  southerly  direction. 
The  object  of  our  journey  was  mentioned  to  no  one.  On  our 
way,  we  were  joined  by  Dr.  Rosen,  the  Prussian  Consul  at 
Jerusalem,  well  known  to  travellers  in  Palestine,  from  his  pro¬ 
found  knowledge  of  sacred  geography,  and,  in  this  instance, 
doubly  valuable  as  a  companion,  from  the  special  attention  which 
he  had  paid  to  the  topography  of  Hebron  and  its  neighborhood.1 
Before  our  arrival  at  Hebron,  the  Pasha  had  made  every  prep¬ 
aration  to  insure  the  safety  of  the  experiment.  What  he  feared 
was,  no  doubt,  a  random  shot  or  stone  from  some  individual 
fanatic,  some  Indian  pilgrim,  such  as  are  well  known  to  hang 
about  these  sacred  places,  and  who  might  have  held  his  life  cheap 
at  the  cost  of  avenging;  what  he  thought  an  outrage  on  the  sane- 
tities  of  his  religion.  Accordingly,  as  our  long  cavalcade  wound 
through  the  narrow  valley  by  which  the  town  of  Hebron  is  ap¬ 
proached,  underneath  the  walls  of  those  vineyards  on  the  hill¬ 
sides,  which  have  made  the  vale  of  Eshcol  immortal,  the  whole 
road  on  either  side  for  more  than  a  mile  was  lined  with  soldiers. 
The  Ap  The  native  population,  which  usually  on  the  Prince’s 
proach.  approach  to  a  town  streamed  out  to  meet  him,  was  in¬ 
visible,  it  may  be  from  compulsion,  it  may  be  from  silent  indig- 

1  See  his  two  Essays  in  the  Zeitschrift  der  Morgenlandischen  Geselhchaft ,  xi.  50; 
xii.  489. 


SKETCH  PLAN  OF  THE  MOSQUE  AT  HEBRON. 


REFERENCE  TO  FIGURES. 

- ♦ - 

1.  Shrine  of  Abraham. 

“  Sarah. 

“  Isaac. 

“  Rebekah. 

“  Jacob. 

“  Leah. 

“  Joseph. 

(  Two  Moham- 
l  medan  Saints. 

9.  Fountain. 

10.  Raised  platform. 

11.  Mihrab. 

1 2.  Merhala *  *  ( or  platform  for 

the  Muezzin). 

13.  Circular  aperture  leading 

to  Cave. 

14.  Minbar  (or  pulpit). 


2. 

3. 

4. 

5. 

6. 

7. 

8. 


(( 


CC 


REFERENCE  TO  LETTERS. 

- ♦ — - 

A.  Flight  of  steps  to  outer  door. 

B.  Long  narrow  passage  of  easy 

steps,  bounded  on  the  left 
by  ancient  Jewish  wall. 

C.  Fountain. 

D.  Here  shoes  are  left  at  the 

door  of  a  ceiled  room. 

E.  Passage  Chamber. 

F.  Mosque,  containing  two 

Shrines. 

G.  Outer  Court. 

H.  Cloister  of  round  arches, 

with  domed  roof.  —  The 
Outer  Narthex. 

K.  Inner  Narthex. 

L.  Nave  of  Byzantine  Church. 

M.  Long,  lofty  Room,  leading 

to  circular  Chamber,  con¬ 
taining  Shrines  of  Jacob 
and  Leah. 

N.  Do.,  to  that  containing 

Shrine  of  Joseph. 

O.  Minaret. 

P.  Windows. 

Q.  Minaret. 

R.  The  J&waliyeh  Mosque, 

built  by  Jawali. 


_  ^ 

N.  B.  —  The  deep  black  lines  mark  the  ancient  Jewish  Wall. 


The  shaded  parts  are  unknown. 


The  accompanying  Plan  was  drawn  up  by  my  friend  and  fellow-traveller,  the  Hon.  R.  H.  Meade,  with  the  assistance  of  Dr.  Rosen,  immediately  after  the 
visit  to  the  Mosque.  It  may  be  compared  with  the  Sketches  of  the  Mosque,  given  from  the  information  of  Mussulmans,  in  Osburn's  Palestine  Past  and 
Present,  and  in  the  Travels  of  Ali  Bey.  I  have  also  compared  it  with  an  unpublished  Plan  shown  to  me  by  the  kindness  of  M.  Piero tti.  Between  these  various 
sketches  there  are  several  points  of  difference.  But  it  has  been  thought  best  to  give  Mr.  Meade's  Plan  as  it  was  drawn  up  at  the  time,  independently  of  any 
other  authority. 


*  I  have  given  the  word  Merhela  as  it  was  repeated  at  the  time ;  the  more  so,  as  it  agrees  with  the  word  Meherel ,  as  used  by  Ali  Bey  (  Travels ,  ii.  232).  But  I  am  informed  by  Arabic  scholars 
that  no  such  word,  in  this  sense,  exists.  The  platform,  in  question,  is,  as  I  am  told  by  Mr.  Lane,  called  dikkel  by  the  Arabs,  and  by  the  Turks,  generally,  Mahfil. 


REFERENCE  TO  LETTERS. 
- ♦ - 


A.  Flight  of  steps  to  outer  door. 

B.  Long  narrow  passage  of  easy 

steps,  bounded  on  the  left 
by  ancient  Jewish  wall. 

C.  Fountain. 

D.  Here  shoes  are  left  at  the 

door  of  a  ceiled  room. 

E.  Passage  Chamber. 

F.  Mosque,  containing  two 

Shrines. 

G.  Outer  Court. 

H.  Cloister  of  round  arches, 

with  domed  roof.  —  The 
Outer  Narthex. 

K.  Inner  Narthex. 

L.  Nave  of  Byzantine  Church. 

M.  Long,  lofty  Room,  leading 

to  circular  Chamber,  con¬ 
taining  Shrines  of  Jacob 
and  Leah. 

N.  Do.,  to  that  containing 

Shrine  of  Joseph. 

O.  Minaret. 

P.  Windows. 

Q.  Minaret. 

R.  The  J&waliyeh  Mosque, 

built  by  Jawali. 


unknown. 


tance  of  Dr.  Rosen,  immediately  after  the 
issulmans,  in  Osburn’s  Palestine  Past  and 
ess  of  M.  Pierotti.  Between  these  various 
Irawn  up  at  the  time,  independently  of  any 


•Is,  ii.  232).  But  I  am  informed  by  Arabic  scholars 
generally,  Mahfil. 


Arp.  II. 


THE  VISIT  OF  THE  PRINCE  OF  WALES. 


543 


nation.  We  at  length  reached  the  greensward  in  front  of  the 
town,  crowned  by  the  Quarantine  and  the  Governor’s  residence. 
There  Suraya  Pasha  received  us.  It  had  been  arranged,  in  ac¬ 
cordance  with  the  Pasha’s  limitation  of  the  numbers,  that  His 
Royal  Highness  should  be  accompanied,  besides  tjie  General,  by 
the  two  members  of  the  party  who  had  given  most  attention  to 
Biblical  pursuits,  so  as  to  make  it  evident  that  the  visit  was  not 
one  of  mere  curiosity,  but  had  also  a  distinct  scientific  purpose. 
It  was,  however,  finally  conceded  by  the  Governor,  that  the 
whole  of  the  suite  should  be  included,  amounting  to  seven  per¬ 
sons  besides  the  Prince.  The  servants  remained  behind.  We 
started  on  foot,  two  and  two,  between  two  files  of  soldiers, 
by  the  ancient  pool  of  Hebron,  up  the  narrow  streets  of  the 
modern  town,  still  lined  with  soldiers.  Hardly  a  face  was  visi¬ 
ble  as  we  passed  through  ;  only  here  and  there  a  solitary  guard, 
stationed  at  a  vacant  window,  or  on  the  flat  roof  of  a  projecting 
house,  evidently  to  guarantee  the  safety  of  the  party  from  any 
chance  missile.  It  was,  in  fact,  a  complete  military  occupation 
of  the  town.  At  length  we  reached  the  south-eastern  corner  of 
the  massive  wall  of  enclosure,  the  point  at  which  inquiring  trav¬ 
ellers  from  generation  to  generation  have  been  checked  in  their 
approach  to  this,  the  most  ancient  and  the  most  authentic  of  all 
the  Holy  Places  of  the  Holy  Land.  “  Here,”  said  Dr.  Rosen, 
“  was  the  furthest  limit  of  my  researches.”  Up  the  steep  flight 
of  the  exterior  staircase  —  gazing  close  at  hand  on  the  polished 
surface  of  the  walk  amply  justifying  Josephus’s  account  of  the 
marble-like  appearance  of  the  huge  stones  which  compose  it  —  we 
rapidly  mounted.  At  the  head  of  the  staircase,  which  by  its 
long  ascent  showed  that  the  platform  of  the  Mosque  was  on  the 
uppermost  slope  of  the  hill,  and  therefore  above  the  level  where,  if 
anywhere,  the  sacred  cave  would  be  found,  a  sharp  turn  at  once 
brought  us  within  the  precincts,  and  revealed  to  us  for  the  first 
time  the  wall  from  the  inside.  A  later  wall  of  Mussulman  times 
has  been  built  on  the  top  of  the  Jewish  enclosure.  The  enclos¬ 
ure  itself,  as  seen  from  the  inside,  rises  but  a  few  feet  above  the 
platform.1 

1  The  expression  of  Arculf  ( Early  Trav-  explained  if  we  suppose  that  he  was  speak- 
ellers ,  p.  7)  that  the  precinct  was  surround-  ing  of  it  as  seen  from  the  inside, 
ed  by  a  low  wall  ( liumili  muro)  might  be 


544 


THE  CAYE  OF  MACHPELAH. 


App.  II. 


Here  we  were  received  with  much  ceremony  by  five  or  six 
The  En-  persons,  corresponding  to  the  Dean  and  Canons  of  a 
onthe  Christian  cathedral.  They  were  the  representatives  of 
Mosque.  the  Forty  hereditary  guardians  of  the  Mosque. 

We  passed  at  once  through  an  open  court  into  the  Mosque. 
The  With  regard  to  the  building  itself,  two  points  at  once 

Mosque.  became  apparent.  First,  it  was  clear  that  it  had  been 
originally  a  Byzantine  church.  To  any  one  acquainted  with  the 
cathedral  of  S.  Sophia  at  Constantinople,  and  with  the  monastic 
churches  of  Mount  Athos,  this  is  evident  from  the  double  nar- 
thex  or  portico,  and  from  the  four  pillars  of  the  nave.  Secondly, 
it  was  clear  that  it  had  been  converted  at  a  much  later  period 
into  a  mosque.  This  is  indicated  by  the  pointed  arches,  and  by 
the  truncation  of  the  apsis.  The  transformation  was  said  by  the 
guardians  of  the  Mosque  to  have  been  made  by  Sultan  Kelaoun. 
The  whole  building  occupies  (to  speak  roughly)  one  third  of  the 
platform.  The  windows  are  sufficiently  high  to  be  visible  from 
without,  above  the  top  of  the  enclosing  wall. 

I  now  proceed  to  describe  the  Tombs  of  the  Patriarchs,  pre- 
The  mising  always  that  these  tombs,  like  all  those  in  Mus- 

of  tile63  sulman  mosques,  and  indeed  like  most  tombs  in  Chris- 
Patriarchs.  tian  Churches,  do  not  profess  to  be  the  actual  places  of 
sepulture,  but  are  merely  monuments  or  cenotaphs  in  honor  of 
the  dead  who  lie  beneath.  Each  is  enclosed  within  a  separate 
chapel  or  shrine,  closed  with  gates  or  railings  similar  to  those 
which  surround  or  enclose  the  special  chapels  or  royal  tombs  in 
Westminster  Abbey.  The  two  first  of  these  shrines  or  chapels 
are  contained  in  the  inner  portico  or  narthex,  before  the  entrance 
into  the  actual  building  of  the  Mosque.  In  the  recess  on  the 
right  is  the  shrine  of  Abraham,  in  the  recess  on  the  left  that  of 
The  shrine  Sarah,  each  guarded  by  silver  gates.  The  shrine  of 
of  Sarah.  Sarah  we  were  requested  not  to  enter,  as  being  that  of 
a  woman.  A  pall  lay  over  it.  The  shrine  of  Abraham,  after  a 

The  Shrine  momenfaiT  hesitation,  was,  thrown  open.  The  guar- 
or  Ahra-  dians  groaned  aloud.  But  their  chief  turned  to  us  with 
the  remark,  “  The  princes  of  any  other  nation  should 
“  have  passed  over  my  dead  body  sooner  than  enter.  But  to  the 
“  eldest  son  of  the  Queen  of  England  we  are  willing  to  accord 


App.  II. 


THE  VISIT  OF  THE  PRINCE  OF  WALES. 


545 


“  even  this  privilege.”  He  stepped  in  before  us,  and  offered  an 
ejaculatory  prayer  to  the  dead  Patriarch,  “  O  Friend  of  God,  for¬ 
give  this  intrusion.”  We  then  entered.  The  chamber  is  cased 
in  marble.  The  so-called  tomb  consists  of  a  coffin-like  structure, 
about  six  feet  high,  built  up  of  plastered  stone  or  marble,  and 
hung  with  three  carpets,1  green  embroidered  with  gold.  They 
are  said  to  have  been  presented  by  Mohamed  II.  the  conqueror 
of  Constantinople,  Selim  I.  the  conqueror  of  Egypt,  and  the  late 
Sultan  Abdul  Mejid.  Fictitious  as  the  actual  structure  was,  it 
was  impossible  not  to  feel  a  thrill  of  unusual  emotion  at  standing 
on  such  a  spot,  —  an  emotion  enhanced  by  the  rare  occasion 
which  had  opened  the  gates  of  that  consecrated  place,  as  the 
guardian  of  the  Mosque  kept  repeating  to  us,  as  we  stood  round 
the  tomb,  “  to  no  one  less  than  the  representative  of  England.” 

Within  the  area  of  the  church  or  mosque  wrnre  shown  the 
tombs  of  Isaac  and  Rebekah.  They  are  placed  under  separate 
chapels,  in  the  walls  of  which  are  windows,  and  of  which  the 
gates  are  grated  not  with  silver,  but  iron  bars.  Their  situation, 
planted  as  they  are  in  the  body  of  the  Mosque,  may  indicate 
their  Christian  origin.  In  almost  all  Mussulman  sanctuaries, 
the  tombs  of  distinguished  persons  are  placed,  not  in  the  centre 

of  the  building,  but  in  the  corners.2  To  Rebekah’s  mi  . 

.  The  Shrine 

tomb  the  same  decorous  rule  of  the  exclusion  of  male  of  Re¬ 
visitors  naturally  applied  as  in  the  case  of  Sarah’s. 

But,  on  requesting  to  see  the  tomb  of  Isaac,  we  were  entreated 
not  to  enter ;  and  on  asking,  with  some  surprise,  why  The  Shrine 
an  objection  which  had  been  conceded  for  Abraham  m  Ipaac’ 
should  be  raised  in  the  case  of  his  far  less  eminent  son,  were 
answered  that  the  difference  lay  in  the  characters  of  the  two 
Patriarchs,  —  “Abraham  was  full  of  loving-kindness:  he  had 
“  withstood  even  the  resolution  of  God  against  Sodom  and  Go- 
“  morrah  ;  he  was  goodness  itself,  and  would  overlook  any  affront. 
“  But  Isaac  was  proverbially  jealous,  and  it  was  exceedingly 
“  dangerous  to  exasperate  him.  When  Ibrahim  Pasha  [as  con- 


1  In  Ali  Bey’s  time  there  were  nine  car¬ 
pets.  Travels ,  ii.  233. 

2  The  arrangement,  however,  described 
by  Arculf  is  somewhat  different.  He 
speaks  of  the  bodies  (probably  meaning 

69 


the  tombs)  lying  north  and  south,  whereas 
they  are  now  east  and  west,  under  slabs 
of  stone.  The  tombs  of  the  wives  he  also 
describes  as  apart,  and  of  a  meaner  con¬ 
struction.  —  Early  Travellers ,  p.  7. 


546 


THE  CAVE  OE  MACHPELAH. 


App.  II. 


“  queror  of  Palestine]  had  endeavored  to  enter,  he  had  been 
“  driven  out  by  Isaac,  and  fell  back  as  if  thunderstruck.” 

The  chapel,  in  fact,  contains  nothing  of  interest;  hut  I  men¬ 
tion  this  storv 1  both  for  the  sake  of  the  singular  sentiment  which 
it  expresses,  and  also  because  it  well  illustrates  the  peculiar  feel¬ 
ing  which  has  tended  to  preserve  the  sanctity  of  the  place,  —  an 
awe,  amounting  to  terror,  of  the  great  personages  who  lay  be¬ 
neath,  and  who  would,  it  was  supposed,  be  sensitive  to  any  dis¬ 
respect  shown  to  their  graves,  and  revenge  it  accordingly. 

The  shrines  of  Jacob  and  Leah  were  shown  in  recesses,  cor- 
The  Shrine  responding  to  those  of  Abraham  and  Sarah, — but  in 

/*  T  1 

0  L,ea  *  a  separate  cloister,  opposite  the  entrance  of  the  Mosque. 
Against  Leah’s  tomb,  as  seen  through  the  iron  grate,  two  green 
banners  reclined,  the  origin  and  meaning  of  which  were  unknown. 
The  Shrine  They  are  placed  in  the  pulpit  on  Fridays.  The  gates 
of  Jacob.  0f  Jacob’s  tomb  were  opened  without  difficulty,  though 
with  a  deep  groan  from  the  by-standers.  There  was  some  good 
painted  glass  in  one  of  the  windows.  The  structure  was  of  the 
same  kind  as  that  in  the  shrine  of  Abraham,  but  with  carpets  of 
a  coarser  texture.  Else  it  calls  for  no  special  remark.  . 

Thus  far  the  monuments  of  the  Mosque  adhere  strictly  to  the 
Biblical  account  as  given  above.  This  is  the  more  remarkable, 
because  in  these  particulars  the  agreement  is  beyond  what  might 
have  been  expected  in  a  Mussulman  sanctuary.  The  prominence 
given  to  Isaac,  whilst  in  entire  accordance  with  the  Sacred  nar¬ 
rative,  is  against  the  tenor  of  Mussulman  tradition,  which  exalts 
Ishmael  into  the  first  place.  And,  in  like  conformity  with  the 
Sacred  narrative,  but  unlike  what  we  should  have  expected,  had 
mere  fancy  been  allowed  full  play,  is  the  exclusion  of  the  famous 
Rachel,  and  the  inclusion  of  the  insignificant  Leah. 

The  variation  which  follows  rests,  as  I  am  informed  by  Dr. 
Rosen,  on  the  general  tradition  of  the  country  (justified,  perhaps, 
by  an  ambiguous  expression  of  Josephus 2)  that  the  body  of 


1  I  have  been  unable  to  discover  the 
origin  of  this  legend. 

2  “  The  bodies  of  the  brothers  of  Joseph 
“  after  a  time  were  buried  by  their  de- 
“  scendants  in  Hebron ;  but  the  bones  of 
“Joseph  afterwards,  when  the  Hebrews 


“  migrated  from  Egypt,  were  taken  to  Ca- 
“  naan.”  —  Ant.  ii.  8,  2.  This  may  be  in¬ 
tended  merely  to  draw  a  distinction  as  to 
the  time  of  removal,  but  probably  it  refers 
also  to  a  difference  in  the  places  of  burial, 
and  expresses  nothing  positive  on  the  sub- 


App.  II. 


THE  VISIT  OF  THE  PRINCE  OF  WALES. 


547 


Joseph,  after  having  been  deposited  first  at  Shechem,  was  sub¬ 
sequently  transported  to  Hebron.  But  the  peculiar  sit-  The  Shrine 
uation  of  this  alleged  tomb  agrees  with  the  exceptional  of  JosePh* 
character  of  the  tradition.  It  is  in  a  domed  chamber  attached 
to  the  enclosure  from  the  outside,  and  reached,  therefore,  by  an 
aperture  broken  through  the  massive  wall  itself,  and  thus  visible 
on  the  exterior  of  the  southern  side  of  the  wall.1  It  is  less 


costly  than  the  others,  and  it  is  remarkable  that,  although  the 
name  of  his  wife  (according  to  the  Mussulman  version,  Zuleika) 
is  inserted  in  the  certificates  given  to  pilgrims  who  have  visited 
the  Mosque,  no  grave  having  that  appellation  is  shown.  A  staff 
was  hung  up  in  a  corner  of  the  chamber.  There  were  painted 
windows  as  in  the  shrine  of  Jacob.  According  to  the  story  told 
by  the  guardian  of  the  Mosque,  Joseph  was  buried  in  the  Nile, 
and  Moses  recovered  the  body,  1005  years  afterwards,  by  marry¬ 
ing  an  Egyptian  wife  who  knew  the  secret. 

No  other  tombs  were  exhibited  inside  the  Mosque.  In  a 
mosque  on  the  northern  side  of  the  great  Mosque  were  two 
shrines,  resembling  those  of  Isaac  and  Rebekah,  which  were  af¬ 
terwards  explained  to  us  as  merely  ornamental.  On  a  platform 
immediately  outside  the  Jewish  wall  on  the  north  side,  and  seen 
from  the  hill  rising  immediately  to  the  north-east  of  the  MosquO, 
is  the  dome  of  a  mosque  named  Jaw  ally  eh,  said  to  have  The 
been  built  by  the  Emir  Abou  Said  Sandjar  Jawali,  from  Mosque  of 
whom,  of  course,  it  derives  its  name,  in  the  place  of  the 
tomb  of  Judas,  or  Judah,  which  he  caused  to  be  destroyed.2 

These  are  the  only  variations  from  the  catalogue  of  tombs  in 
the  Book  of  Genesis.  In  the  fourth  century,  the  Bourdeaux  pil¬ 
grim  saw  only  the  six  great  patriarchal  shrines.  But  from  the 
seventh  century  downwards,  one  or  more  lesser  tombs  seem  to 


ject.  In  Acts  vii.  15, 16,  the  sons  of  Jacob 
are  represented  as  all  equally  buried  at 
Shechem ;  but  then  it  is  with  the  perplex¬ 
ing  addition  that  they  were  buried  in  the 
same  place  as  Jacob ,  and  “  in  the  sepulchre 
“  that  Abraham  bought  for  a  sum  of  money 
“  from  the  sons  of  Emmor  the  father  of 
“  Shechem.”  The  burial  of  Joseph  at 
Shechem  is  distinctly  mentioned  in  Josh, 
xxiv.  32.  “  The  bones  of  Joseph,  which 
the  children  of  Israel  brought  up  out 


“  of  Egypt,  buried  they  in  Shechem ,  in 
11 1  the  parcel  of  the  field ’  which  Jacob 
“  bought  of  the  sons  of  Hamor  the  father 
“  of  Shechem  for  a  hundred  pieces  of  sil- 
“  ver;  and  it  became  the  inheritance  of  the 
“  sons  of  Joseph.” 

1  This  aperture  was  made  by  Dslhar 
Barkok,  A.  d.  1382-1389.  —  Quartremdre, 
247. 

2  a.  d.  1319, 1320.  Quartremere,  i.  part 
ii.  p.  248. 


548 


THE  CAVE  OF  MACHPELAH. 


App.  II. 


have  been  shown.  Arculf  speaks  of  the  tomb  of  Adam,1  “  which 
“is  of  meaner  workmanship  than  the  rest,  and  lies  not  far  off 
“  from  them  at  the  farthest  extremity  to  the  north.”  If  we 
might  take  this  direction  of  the  compass  to  he  correct,  he  must 
mean  either  “the  tomb  of  Judah”  or  one  of  the  two  in  the 
northern  mosque.  This  latter  conjecture  is  confirmed  by  the 
statement  of  Maundeville  that  the  tombs  of  Adam  and  Eve 
were  shown  ; 2  which  would  thus  correspond  to  these  two.  The 
tomb  of  Joseph  is  first  distinctly  mentioned  by  Ssewulf,  who  says 
that  “  the  bones  of  J oseph  were  buried  more  humbly  than  the 
“  rest,  as  it  were  at  the  extremity  of  the  castle.”3  Mr.  Monro 
describes  further  “  a  tomb  of  Esau,  under  a  small  cupola,  with 
“  eight  or  ten  windows,  excluded  from  lying  with  the  rest  of  the 
“  Patriarchs.”  4  Whether  by  this  he  meant  the  tomb  of  Joseph, 
or  the  tomb  of  Judah,  is  not  clear.  A  Mussulman  tomb  of  Esau 
was  shown  in  the  suburb  of  Hebron  called  Sir.5 

The  tomb  of  Abner  is  shown  in  the  town,  and  the  tomb  of 
Jesse  on  the  hill  facing  Hebron  on  the  south.  But  these  have 
no  connection  with  the  Mosque,  or  the  patriarchal  burying-place. 

We  have  now  gone  through  all  the  shrines,  whether  of  real  or 
The  fictitious  importance,  which  the  Sanctuary  includes. 

Sacred  It  will  be  seen  that  up  to  this  point  no  mention  has 
been  made  of  the  subject  of  the  greatest  interest, 
namely,  the  sacred  cave  itself,  in  which  one  at  least  of  the  pa¬ 
triarchal  family  may  possibly  still  repose  intact,  —  the  embalmed 
body  of  Jacob.  It  may  be  well  supposed  that  to  this  object  our 
inquiries  were  throughout  directed.  One  indication  alone  of  the 
cavern  beneath  was  visible.  In  the  interior  of  the  Mosque,  at 
the  corner  of  the  shrine  of  Abraham,  was  a  small  circular  hole, 


1  The  tomb  of  Adam  was  shown  as  the 
“  Fourth  ”  of  the  “  Four,”  who,  with  the 
three  Patriarchs,  were  supposed  to  have 
given  to  Hebron  the  name  of  Kirjath-Arba, 
“  the  city  of  the  Four.”  By  a  strange 
mistake  which  Jerome  has  perpetuated  in 
the  Vulgate  translation,  the  word  Adam 
in  Joshua  xxiv.  15,  “  a  great  man  among 
the  Anakims,”  has  been  taken  by  some  of 
the  Rabbis  as  a  proper  name.  “  Adam 
maximus  ibi  inter  Enacim  situs  est.” 
That  there  was  a  fixed  tradition  about 


Adam  in  Hebron  appears  from  the  legend 
which  represents  a  natural  well  in  the  hill 
facing  the  mosque  as  that  in  which  Adam 
and  Eve  hid  themselves  after  the  flight 
from  Paradise;  and  Hebron  is  also  repre¬ 
sented  as  the  place  of  his  creation.  This 
was  pointed  out  to  Maundeville  ( Early 
Travellers ,  p.  161 ). 

2  Maundeville  ( Early  Travellers ,  p.  161) 

3  A.  d.  1102  ( Early  Travellers ,  p.  45). 

4  Summer  Ramble ,  i.  243. 

5  Quatremere,  i.  pt.  ii.  p.  319. 


App.  II. 


THE  VISIT  OF  THE  PRINCE  OF  WALES. 


549 


about  eight  inches  across,  of  which  one  foot  above  the  pavement 
was  built  of  strong  masonry,  but  of  which  the  lower  part,  as  far 
as  we  could  see  and  feel,  was  of  the  living  rock.1  This  cavity 
appeared  to  open  into  a  dark  space  beneath,  and  that  space 
(which  the  guardians  of  the  Mosque  believed  to  extend  under 
the  whole  platform)  can  hardly  be  anything  else  than  the  ancient 
cavern  of  Machpelah.  This  was  the  only  aperture  which  the 
guardians  recognized.  Once,  they  said,  2,500  years  ago,  a  servant 
of  a  great  king  had  penetrated  through  some  other  entrance.  He 
descended  in  full  possession  of  his  faculties,  and  of  remarkable  cor¬ 
pulence  ;  he  returned,  blind,  deaf,  withered,  and  crippled.  Since 
then  the  entrance  was  closed,  and  this  aperture  alone  was  left, 
partly  for  the  sake  of  suffering  the  holy  air  of  the  cave  to  escape  in¬ 
to  the  Mosque,  and  be  scented  by  the  faithful ;  partly  for  the  sake 
of  allowing  a  lamp  to  be  let  down  by  a  chain  which  we  saw  sus¬ 
pended  at  the  mouth,  to  burn  upon  the  sacred  grave.  We  asked 
whether  it  could  not  be  lighted  now.  “  No,”  they  said  ;  “  the 
“  saint  likes  to  have  a  lamp  at  night,  but  not  in  the  full  daylight.” 

With  that  glimpse  into  the  dark  void  we  and  the  world  with¬ 
out  must  for  the  present  be  satisfied.  Whether  any  other  en¬ 
trance  is  known  to  the  Mussulmans  themselves,  must  be  a  matter 
of  doubt.  The  original  entrance  to  the  cave,  if  it  is  now  to  be 
found  at  all,  must  probably  be  on  the  southern  face  of  the  hill, 
between  the  Mosque  and  the  gallery  containing  the  shrine  of 
Joseph,  and  entirely  obstructed  by  the  ancient  Jewish  wall,  prob¬ 
ably  built  across  it  for  this  very  purpose. 

It  seems  to  our  notions  almost  incredible  that  Christians  and 
Mussulmans,  each  for  a  period  of  600  years,  should  have  held 
possession  of  the  sanctuary,  and  not  had  the  curiosity  to  explore 
what  to  us  is  the  one  object  of  interest,  —  the  cave.  But  the  fact 


1  This  hole  was  not  shown  to  Ali  Bey, 
perhaps  as  being  only  an  ordinary  pilgrim. 
It  is  thus  described  by  Mr.  Monro  or  his 
informant:  — “A  baldachin,  supported  on 
four  small  columns  over  an  octagon  figure 
of  black  and  white  inlaid,  round  a  small 
hole  in  the  pavement”  (i.  264).  It  is  also 
mentioned  by  the  Arab  historians.  “  There 
“  is  a  vault  that  passes  for  the  burial-place 
“  of  Abraham,  in  which  is  a  lamp  always 
u  lighted.  Hence  the  common  expression 


“  among  the  people,  ‘  the  Lord  of  the  vault 
“  and  the  lamp'"  (Quatremere,  i.  pt.  ii. 
p.  247).  “  Near  the  tomb  of  Abraham  is 
“  a  vault,  where  is  a  small  gate  leading 
“  to  the  minbar  (pulpit).  Into  this  hole 
“  once  fell  an  idiot,  who  was  followed  by 
“  the  servants  of  the  Mosque.  They  saw 
“  a  stone  staircase  of  fifteen  steps,  which 
“led  to  the  minbar"  (Ibid.)  The  lamp  is 
also  mentioned  by  Mr.  Monro  (i.  p.  244), 
and  by  Benjamin  of  Tudela  (see  p.  551). 


550 


THE  CAVE  OF  MACHPEEAH. 


Apr.  II. 


is  undoubted  that  no  account  exists  of  any  such  attempt.  Such 
a  silence  can  only  be  explained  (but  it  is  probably  a  sufficient 
explanation)  by  the  indifference  which  prevailed,  throughout  the 
Middle  Ages,  to  any  historical  spots  however  interesting,  unless 
they  were  actually  consecrated  as  places  of  pilgrimage.  The 
Mount  of  Olives,  the  site  of  the  Temple  of  Solomon,  the  Rock 
of  the  Holy  Sepulchre  itself,  were  not  thought  worthy  of  even 
momentary  consideration,  in  comparison  with  the  chapels  and 
stations  which  were  the  recognized  objects  of  devotion.  Thus 
at  Hebron  a  visit  to  the  shrines,  both  for  Christians  and  Mussul¬ 
mans,  procures  a  certificate.  The  cave  had  therefore  no  further 
value.  In  the  case  of  the  Mussulmans  this  indifference  is  still 
more  general.  Suraya  Pasha  himself,  a  man  of  considerable  in¬ 
telligence,  professed  that  he  had  never  thought  of  visiting  the 
Mosque  of  Hebron  for  any  other  purpose  than  that  of  snuffing 
the  sacred  air,  and  he  had  never,  till  we  arrived  at  Jerusalem, 
seen  the  wonderful  convent  of  Mar  Saba,  or  the  Dead  Sea,  or  the 
Jordan.  And  to  this  must  be  added,  if  not  in  his  case,  in  that 
of  Mussulmans  generally,  the  terror  which  they  entertain  of  the 
effect  of  the  wrath  of  the  Patriarchs  on  any  one  who  should  in¬ 
trude  into  the  place  where  they  are  supposed  still  to  be  in  a  kind 
of  suspended  animation.  As  far  back  as  the  seventeenth  century 
it  was  firmly  believed  that  if  any  Mussulman  entered  the  cavern, 
immediate  death  would  be  the  consequence.1 

It  should  be  mentioned,  however,  that  two  accounts  are  re¬ 
ported  of  travellers  having  obtained  a  nearer  view  of  the  cave 
than  was  accomplished  in  the  visit  of  the  Prince  of  Wales. 

The  first  is  contained  in  the  pilgrimage  of  Benjamin  of  Tudela, 
Benjamin  the  Jewish  traveller  of  the  twelfth  century  :  —  “  The 
of  ludeia.  u  Qeutiles  have  erected  six  sepulchres  in  this  place, 
“  which  they  pretend  to  be  those  of  Abraham  and  Sarah,  Isaac 
“  and  Rebekah,  Jacob  and  Leah.  The  pilgrims  are  told  that 
“  they  are  the  sepulchres  of  the  fathers,  and  money  is  extorted 
“  from  them.  But  if  any  Jew  comes,  who  gives  an  additional 
“  fee  to  the  keeper  of  the  cave,  an  iron  door  is  opened,  which 
“  dates  from  the  time  of  our  forefathers  who  rest  in  peace,  and 
“  with  a  burning  candle  in  his  hands,  the  visitor  descends  into  a 


1  Quaresmius,  ii.  772. 


Arp.  II. 


ACCOUNT  OF  M.  PIEROTTI. 


551 


“  first  cave,  which  is  empty,  traverses  a  second  in  the  same  state, 
“  and  at  last  reaches  a  third,  wThich  contains  six  sepulchres,  those 
“  of  Abraham,  Isaac,  and  Jacob,  and  of  Sarah,  Rebekah,  and 
“  Leah,  one  opposite  the  other.  All  these  sepulchres  bear  in- 
“  scriptions,  the  letters  being  engraved.  Thus,  upon  that  of 
“  Abraham  we  read :  —  ‘  This  is  the  sepulchre  of  our  father 
“  4  Abraham ;  upon  whom  be  peace,’  and  so  on  that  of  Isaac, 
“  and  upon  all  the  other  sepulchres.  A  lamp  burns  in  the  cave 
“  and  upon  the  sepulchres  continually,  both  night  and  day,  and 
“  you  there  see  tombs  filled  with  the  bones  of  Israelites,  —  for 
“  unto  this  day  it  is  a  custom  of  the  house  of  Israel  to  bring 
“  hither  the  bones  of  their  saints  and  of  their  forefathers,  and  to 
“  leave  them  there.” 

In  this  account,1  which,  as  may  be  observed,  does  not  profess 
to  describe  Benjamin’s  own  experience,  there  are  two  circum¬ 
stances  (besides  its  general  improbability)  which  throw  consider¬ 
able  doubt  on  its  accuracy.  One  is  the  mention  of  inscriptions, 
and  of  an  iron  door,  which,  as  is  well  known,  are  never  found  in 
Jewish  sepulchres.  The  other  is  the  mention  of  the  practice  of 
Jews  sending  their  bones  to  be  buried  in  a  place,  which,  as  is 
evident  from  the  rest  of  the  narrative,  could  only  be  entered  with 
the  greatest  difficulty. 

The  second  account  is  that  of  M.  Ermete  Pierotti,  who,  hav¬ 
ing  been  an  engineer  in  the  Sardinian  army,  acted  for  jp  Ermete 
some  years  as  architect  and  engineer  to  Suraya  Pasha,  Pierottl- 
at  Jerusalem,  and  thus  obtained,  both  in  that  city  and  at  Hebron, 
access  to  places  otherwise  closed  to  Europeans.  The  following 
account  appeared  in  the  “  Times  ”  of  April  30,  1862,  immediately 
following  on  the  announcement  of  the  Prince’s  visit :  — 

“  The  true  entrance  to  the  Patriarchs’  tomb  is  to  be  seen  close 
“  to  the  western  wall  of  the  enclosure,  and  near  the  north-west 
“  corner ;  it  is  guarded  by  a  very  thick  iron  railing,  and  I  was 
“  not  allowed  to  go  near  it.  I  observed  that  the  Mussulmans 
“  themselves  did  not  go  very  near  it.  In  the  court  opposite  the 
“  entrance  gate  of  the  Mosque,  there  is  an  opening,  through 

1  A  somewhat  similar  account  is  given  persons  saw  the  bodies,  preserved  without 
by  Moawiyeh  Ishmail,  Prince  of  Aleppo,  change;  and  that  in  the  cavern  were  ar- 
—  that  in  A.  d.  1089  the  tombs  of  Abraham,  ranged  lamps  of  gold  and  silver  (Quatre- 
Isaac,  and  Jacob  were  found;  that  many  mere,  245). 


552 


THE  CAYE  OF  MACHPELAH. 


Arp.  II. 


“  which  I  was  allowed  to  go  down  for  three  steps,  and  I  was  able 
“  to  ascertain  by  sight  and  touch  that  the  rock  exists  there,  and 
“  to  conclude  it  to  be  about  five  feet  thick.  From  the  short  ob- 
“  servations  I  could  make  during  my  brief  descent,  as  also  from 
“  the  consideration  of  the  east  wall  of  the  Mosque,  and  the  little 
“  information  I  extracted  from  the  Chief  Santon,  who  jealously 
“  guards  the  sanctuary,  I  consider  that  a  part  of  the  grotto  exists 
“  under  the  Mosque,  and  that  the  other  part  is  under  the  court, 
“  but  at  a  lower  level  than  that  lying  under  the  Mosque.  This 
“  latter  must  be  separated  from  the  former  by  a  vertical  stratum 
“  of  rock  which  contains  an  opening,  as  I  conclude,  for  two  rea- 
“  sons  :  first,  because  the  east  wall,  being  entirely  solid  and  mas- 
“  sive,  requires  a  good  foundation ;  secondly,  because  the  petitions 
“  which  the  Mussulmans  present  to  the  Santon  to  be  transmitted 
“  to  the  Patriarchs  are  thrown,  some  through  one  opening,  some 
“  through  the  other,  according  to  the  Patriarch  to  whom  they 
“  are  directed ;  and  the  Santon  goes  down  by  the  way  I  wrent, 
“  whence  I  suppose  that  on  that  side  there  is  a  vestibule,  and 
“  that  the  tombs  may  be  found  below  it.  I  explained  my  con¬ 
jectures  to  the  Santon  himself  after  leaving  the  Mosque,  and 
“  he  showed  himself  very  much  surprised  at  the  time,  and  told 
“  the  Pasha  afterwards  that  I  knew  more  about  it  than  the  Turks 
“  themselves.  The  fact  is,  that  even  the  Pasha  who  governs  the 
“  province  has  no  right  to  penetrate  into  the  sacred  enclosure, 
“  where  (according  to  the  Mussulman  legend)  the  Patriarchs  are 
“  living,  and  only  condescend  to  receive  the  petitions  addressed 

“  to  them  by  mortals.”  1 
«/ 

It  will  be  seen  that  this  statement  of  the  entrance  of  the  San¬ 
ton,  or  Sheik  of  the  Mosque,  into  the  cave,  agrees  with  the  state¬ 
ment  given  in  my  Lectures ;  “  that  the  cave  consists  of  two 
“  compartments,  into  one  of  which  a  dervish  or  skeik  is  allowed 
“  to  penetrate  on  special  emergencies.” 2  Against  this  must  be 

1  M.  Pierotti  adds  (what  has  often  been  “  erture  is  on  the  ground  level.”  This 
observed  before)  that  “  the  Jews  who  dwell  however,  is  merely  an  access  to  the  rock, 
“  in  Hebron,  or  visit  it,  are  allowed  to  kiss  not  to  the  cave. 

“  and  touch  a  piece  of  the  sacred  rock  close  2  Lecture  II.  p.  37.  This  wras  founded 
“  to  the  north-west  corner,  which  they  can  on  the  information  of  our  Mussulman  ser- 
“  reach  through  a  small  aperture.  To  ac-  vants  in  1853.  In  1862  I  was  unable  to 
“  complish  this  operation  they  are  obliged  gain  any  confirmation  of  the  story. 

“  to  lie  flat  on  the  ground,  because  the  ap- 


Arp.  II. 


RESULTS  OE  THE  PRINCE’S  VISIT. 


553 


set  the  repeated  assertions  of  the  guardian  of  the  Mosque,  and 
of  the  Governor  of  Jerusalem,  (which,  as  has  been  seen,  are 
substantially  confirmed  by  the  Arab  historians,)  that  no  Mussul¬ 
man  has  ever  entered  the  cave  within  the  memory  of  man.  Of 
the  staircase  and  gate  described  by  M.  Pierotti,  there  was  no  ap¬ 
pearance  on  our  visit,  though  we  must  have  walked  over  the 
very  spot,  —  being,  in  fact,  the  pavement  in  front  of  the  Mosque. 
Of  the  separate  apertures  for  throwing  down  the  petitions  we 
also  sawr  nothing.  And  it  would  seem  from  Finati’s  account, 
that  the  one  hole  down  which  he  threw  his  petition  was  that  by 
the  tomb  of  Abraham.1 

The  result  of  the  Prince’s  visit  will  have  been  disappointing 
to  those  who  expected  a  more  direct  solution  of  the  Results 
mysteries  of  Hebron.  But  it  has  not  been  without  pace’s 
its  indirect  benefits.  In  the  first  place,  by  His  Royal  visit- 
Highness’s  entrance,  the  first  step  has  been  taken  for  the  removal 
of  the  bar  of  exclusion  from  this  most  sacred  and  interesting 
spot.  The  relaxation  may  in  future  times  be  slight  and  gradual, 
and  the  advantage  gained  must  be  used  with  every  caution  ;  but 
it  is  impossible  not  to  feel  that  some  effect  will  be  produced  even 
on  the  devotees  of  Hebron  when  they  feel  that  the  Patriarchs 
have  not  suffered  any  injury  or  affront,  and  that  even  Isaac  rests 
tranquilly  in  his  grave.  Even  on  our  return  to  our  emcampment 
that  evening,  and  in  our  rides  in  and  around  Hebron  the  next 
day,  such  an  effect  might  be  discerned.  Dr.  Rosen  had  predicted 
beforehand  that  if  the  entrance  were  once  made,  no  additional 
precautions  need  be  provided.  “  They  will  be  so  awe-struck  at  the 
“  success  of  your  attempt,  that  they  will  at  once  acquiesce  in  it.” 
And  so  in  fact  it  proved.  Although  we  were  still  accompanied 
by  a  small  escort,  yet  the  rigid  vigilance  of  the  previous  day  was 
relaxed,  and  no  indications  appeared  of  any  annoyance  or  anger. 
And  Englishmen  may  fairly  rejoice  that  this  advance  in  the 
cause  of  religious  tolerance  (if  it  may  so  be  called)  and  of 
Biblical  knowledge,  was  attained  in  the  person  of  the  heir  to 

1  “  I  went  into  a  mosque  at  Hebron  and  “  way,  or  reaches  the  bottom,  it  is  looked 
“  threw  a  paper  down  into  a  hole  that  is  “  upon  as  a  sign  of  good  or  ill  luck  for  the 
“  considered  to  be  the  tomb  of  Abraham,  “petitioner.” — Travels  of  Finati ,  ii.  p. 
n  and  according  as  the  paper  lodges  by  the  236. 

70 


654 


GENERAL  RESULTS. 


App.  II. 


the  English  throne,  out  of  regard  to  the  position  which  he  and 
his  country  hold  in  the  Eastern  world. 

In  the  second  place,  the  visit  has  enabled  us  to  form  a  much 
clearer  judgment  of  the  value  of  the  previous  accounts,  to  cor¬ 
rect  their  deficiencies  and  to  rectify  their  confusion.  The  narra¬ 
tive  of  Ali  Bey  in  particular,  is  now  substantially  corroborated. 
The  existence  and  the  exact  situation  of  the  cave  underneath 
the  floor  of  the  Mosque,  the  appearance  of  the  ancient  enclosure 
from  within,  the  precise  relation  of  the  different  shrines  to  each 
other,  and  the  general  conformity  of  the  traditions  of  the  Mosque 
to  the  accounts  of  the  Bible  and  of  early  travellers,  are  now  for 
the  first  time  clearly  ascertained.  To  discover  the  entrance  of 
the  cave,  to  examine  the  actual  places  of  the  patriarchal  sep¬ 
ulture,  and  to  set  eyes  (if  so  be)  on  the  embalmed  body 
of  Jacob,  the  only  patriarch  the  preservation  of  whose  remains  is 
thus  described,  must  be  reserved  for  the  explorers  of  another 
generation,  for  whom  this  visit  will  have  been  the  best  prepara¬ 
tion. 

Meanwhile,  it  may  be  worth  while  to  recall  the  general  in- 
Generai  struction  furnished  by  the  nearer  contemplation  of  this 
results.  remarkable  spot.  The  narrative  itself  to  which  it  takes 
us  back  stands  alone  in  the  Patriarchal  history  for  the  precision 
with  which  both  locality  and  character  are  delineated.  First, 
there  is  the  death  of  Sarah  in  the  city  of  Kirjath-Arba,  whilst 
Abraham  is  absent,1  apparently  at  Mamre.  He  comes  to  make 
the  grand  display  of  funeral  grief,  u  mourning  aloud  and  weep¬ 
ing  aloud,”  such  as  would  befit  so  great  a  death.  He  is  filled 
with  the  desire,  not  Egyptian,  not  Christian,  hardly  Greek  or 
Roman,  but  certainly  Jewish,  to  thrust  away  the  dark  shadow 
that  has  fallen  upon  him,  “  to  bury  his  dead  out  of  his  sight.”  2 
Then  ensues  the  conference  in  the  gate,  —  the  Oriental  place  of 
assembly,  where  the  negotiators  and  the  witnesses  of  the  transac¬ 
tion,  as  at  the  present  day,  are  gathered  from  the  many  comers 
and  goers  through  “  the  gate  of  the  city.”  3  As  in  the  Gentile 
traditions  of  Damascus,  and  as  in  the  ancient  narrative  of  the 
pursuit  of  the  five  kings,  Abraham  is  saluted  by  the  native 
inhabitants,  not  merely  as  a  wandering  shepherd,  but  as  a 


1  Gen.  xxiii.  2. 


2  Ibid.  4. 


3  Ibid.  10. 


Apr.  II. 


GENERAL  RESULTS. 


555 


44  Prince  of  God.”  1  The  inhabitants  are,  as  we  might  expect, 
not  the  Amorites,  but  the  Hittites,  whose  name  is  that  recog¬ 
nized  by  all  the  surrounding  nations.2  They  offer  him  the  most 
sacred  of  their  sepulchres  for  the  cherished  remains.3  The  Pa¬ 
triarch  maintains  his  determination  to  remain  aloof  from  the 
Canaanite  population,  at  the  same  time  that  he  preserves  every 
form  of  courtesy  and  friendliness,  in  accordance  with  the  mag¬ 
nificent  toleration  and  inborn  gentleness  which  pervade  his 
character.4 *  First,  as  in  the  attitude  of  Oriental  respect,  44  he 
stands,”  and  then,  twice  over,  he  prostrates  himself  on  the 
ground,  before  the  heathen  masters  of  the  soil.6  Ephron,  the 
son  of  Zohar,  is  worthy  of  the  occasion  ;  his  courtesy  matches 
that  of  the  Patriarch  himself :  —  44  The  field  give  I  thee,  the 
44  cave  ....  give  I  thee ;  in  the  presence  of  the  sons  of  my 
44  people  give  I  it  thee.”  41  What  is  that  betwixt  thee  and 
44  me  ?  ”  6  It  is  precisely  the  profuse  liberality  with  which  the 
Arab  of  the  present  time  places  everything  in  his  possession  at 
the  disposal  of  the  stranger.  But  the  Patriarch,  with  the  high 
independence  of  his  natural  character,  (shall  we  say,  also,  with 
the  caution  of  his  Jewish  descendants  ?)  will  not  be  satisfied 
without  a  regular  bargain.  He  44  weighs  out  ”  7  the  coin.  He 
specifies  every  detail  in  the  property  ;  not  the  field  only,  but  the 
cave  in  the  field,  and  the  trees  in  the  field,  and  on  the  edge  of 
the  field,  44  were  made  sure.”  8  The  result  is  the  first  legal  con¬ 
tract  recorded  in  human  history,  the  first  known  interment  of 
the  dead,  the  first  assignment  of  property  to  the  Hebrew  peo¬ 
ple  in  the  Holy  Land.9 

To  this  graphic  and  natural  scene,  not,  indeed,  by  an  absolute 
continuity  of  proof,  but  by  such  evidence  as  has  been  given 
above,  the  cave  of  Machpelah  carries  us  back.  And  if  in  the 
long  interval  which  elapses  between  the  description  of  the  spot 
in  the  Book  of  Genesis  (whatever  date  we  assign  to  that  descrip¬ 
tion)  and  the  notice  of  the  present  sanctuary  by  Josephus,  so 


1  Gen.  xxiii.  6 ;  comp.  Lect.  1. 11;  II.  46. 

2  See  Lecture  II.  30. 

8  Gen.  xxiii.  6. 

4  See  Lecture  II.  43. 

6  Gen.  xxiii.  7-12. 

«  Ibid.  13-15. 


7  Ibid.  16. 

8  Ibid.  17. 

9  Several  of  the  above  details  are  sug¬ 
gested  by  an  excellent  passage  on  this 
subject  in  Thomson’s  Land  and  Booh ,  pp. 
577-579. 


556 


GENERAL  RESULTS. 


App.  II. 


venerable  a  place  and  so  remarkable  a  transaction  are  passed 
over  without  a  word  of  recognition,  this  must,  on  any  hypothesis, 
be  reckoned  amongst  the  many  proofs  that,  in  ancient  literature, 
no  argument  can  be  drawn  against  a  fact  from  the  mere  silence 
of  authors,  whether  sacred  or  secular,  whose  minds  were  fixed 
on  other  subjects,  and  who  were  writing  with  another  inten¬ 
tion. 


PLAN  OF  MOUNT  GERIZIM. 


1.  Fortress. 

2.  Seven  steps  of  Adam  out  of  Paradise. 

3.  Scene  of  the  offering  of  Isaac,  —  a  trough  like  that  used  for  the  Paschal 

Feast. 

4.  “  Holy  Place.” 

5.  Joshua’s  Twelve  Stones. 

6.  “  Tomb  of  Sheik  Ghranem,”  or  “  Shechem  ben  Hamor.” 

7.  “  Cave  where  the  Tabernacle  was  built.” 

8.  Hole  where  the  Paschal  sheep  are  roasted, 

9.  Trench  where  they  are  eaten. 

10.  Platform  for  the  celebration  of  the  Passover. 

11.  Hole  where  the  water  is  boiled. 


App.  in. 


THE  SAMARITAN  PASSOVER. 


559 


APPENDIX  III. 

THE  SAMARITAN  PASSOVER. 

The  illustration  which  I  have  endeavored  to  furnish  of  the 
original  J ewish  Passover,1  from  the  institution  of  the  Samaritan 
Passover,  was  drawn  from  a  description  given  to  me  in  1854  by 
Mr.  Rogers,2  now  Consul  at  Damascus.  During  my  late  jour¬ 
ney  with  the  Prince  of  Wales,  I  was  enabled  myself  to  be  present 
at  its  celebration,  and  I  am  induced  to  give  a  full  account  of  it, 
the  more  so  as  it  is  evident  that  the  ceremonial  has  been  consid¬ 
erably  modified  since  the  time  when  it  was  first  recounted  to 
me.  Even  to  that  lonely  community  the  influences  of  Western 
change  have  extended ;  and  this  is  perhaps  the  last  generation 
which  will  have  the  opportunity  of  witnessing  this  vestige  of  the 
earliest  Jewish  ritual. 

The  Samaritan  Passover  is  celebrated  at  the  same  time  as  the 
Jewish,  —  namely,  on  the  full  moon  of  the  month  Nisan.  In 
the  present  instance,  either  by  design  or  by  a  fortunate  mistake, 
the  Samaritan  community  had  anticipated  the  14th  of  the  month 
by  two  days.  It  was  on  the  evening  of  Saturday  the  18th  of 
April  that  we  ascended  Mount  Gerizim,  and  visited  the  various 
traditional  localities  on  the  rocky  platform  which  crowns  that 
most  ancient  of  sanctuaries.  The  wdiole  community  —  amount¬ 
ing,  it  is  said,  to  one  hundred  and  fifty-two,  from  which  hardly 
any  variation  has  taken  place  within  the  memory  of  man  —  were 
encamped  in  tents  on  a  level  space,  a  few  hundred  yards  below 
the  actual  summit  of  the  mountain,  selected  on  account  of  its 
comparative  shelter  and  seclusion.3  The  women  were  shut  up  in 

1  See  Lecture  V.  p.  134.  8  It  is  only  within  the  last  twenty  years 

2  His  account  has  since  been  printed  in  that  the  Samaritans  (chiefly  through  the 

his  sister’s  interesting  work,  Domestic  Life  intervention  of  the  English  Consul)  have 
in  Palestine ,  281.  regained  the  right,  or  rather  the  safety,  of 


560 


THE  SAMARITAN  PASSOVER. 


App.  Ill 


the  tents.1  The  men  were  assembled  on  the  rocky  terrace  in 
mi  sacred  costume.  In  1854  they  all  wore  the  same  sa- 

The  J 

prepara-  cred  costume.  On  this  occasion  most  of  them  were  in 
their  ordinary  dress.  Only  about  fifteen  of  the  elder 
men,  amongst  whom  was  the  Priest  Amram,2  were  clothed,  as 
formerly  was  the  case  with  the  whole  community,  in  long  white 
robes.  To  these  must  be  added  six  youths,3  dressed  in  white 
shirts  and  white  drawers.  The  feet  both  of  these  and  of  the 
elders  were  at  this  time  of  the  solemnity  bare.  It  was  about 
half  an  hour  before  sunset,  that  the  whole  male  community  in 
an  irregular  form  (those  attired  as  has  been  described  in  a  more 
regular  order)  gathered  round  a  long  trough  that  had  been  pre¬ 
viously  dug  in  the  ground ;  and  the  Priest,  ascending  a  large 
rough  stone  in  front  of  the  congregation,  recited  in  a  loud  chant 
or  scream,  in  which  the  others  joined,  prayers  or  praises  chiefly 
turning  on  the  glories  of  Abraham  and  Isaac.  Their  attitude 
was  that  of  all  Orientals  in  prayer :  standing,  occasionally  diver¬ 
sified  by  the  stretching  out  of  the  hands,  and  more  rarely  by 
kneeling  or  crouching,  with  their  faces  wrapt  in  their  clothes 
and  bent  to  the  ground,4  towards  the  Holy  Place  on  the  summit 
of  Gerizim.  The  Priest  recited  his  prayers  by  heart ;  the  others 
had  mostly  books,  in  Hebrew  and  Arabic. 


holding  their  festival  on  Mount  Gerizim. 
For  a  long  time  before,  they  had  celebrated 
the  Passover  like  the  modern  Jews,  and, 
as  in  the  first  celebration  of  the  institution 
in  Egypt,  in  their  own  houses.  The  per¬ 
formance  of  the  solemnity  on  Gerizim  is 
in  strict  conformity  with  the  principle  laid 
down  in  Deut.  xvi.  15  —  “  Thou  shalt  keep 
a  solemn  feast  in  the  place  which  the  Lord 
thy  God  shall  choose  ”  —  and  with  the 
practice  which  prevailed  in  Judaea  till  the 
fall  of  Jerusalem,  of  celebrating  the  Pass- 
over  at  the  Temple. 

1  Those  women  who,  by  the  approach 
uf  childbirth  or  other  ceremonial  reasons, 
were  prevented  from  sharing  in  the  cel¬ 
ebration,  remained  in  Nablfis. 

2  It  is  stated  in  Miss  Rogers’s  Domestic 
Life  in  Palestine  (249)  that  Amram  is  not 
properly  a  priest  (the  legitimate  high 
priest  —  the  last  descendant,  as  they  al¬ 


lege,  of  Aaron  —  having  expired  some 
years  ago),  and  that  he  is  only  a  Levite. 
He  is,  however,  certainly  called  “  the 
priest  ”  (Cohen).  He  has  two  wives. 
The  children  of  the  first  died  in  infancv, 
and  he  was  therefore  entitled,  by  Samar¬ 
itan  usage,  to  take  a  second.  By  her  he 
has  a  son,  Isaac.  But,  according  to  the 
Oriental  law  of  succession,  he  will  be  suc¬ 
ceeded  in  his  office  by  his  nephew  Jacob, 
as  the  oldest  of  the  family. 

3  These  youths  were  evidently  trained 
for  the  purpose;  but  whether  they  held 
any  sacred  office,  I  could  not  learn.  In 
the  Jewish  ritual,  the  lambs  were  usually 
slain  by  the  householders,  but  on  great 
occasions  (2  Chron.  xxxv.  10)  apparently 
by  the  Levites. 

4  Compare  the  attitude  of  Elijah  (1  Kings 
xviii.  42;  xix.  13). 


App.  III. 


THE  SAMARITAN  PASSOVER. 


561 


Presently,  suddenly,  there  appeared  amongst  the  worshippers 
six  sheep,1  driven  up  by  the  side  of  the  youths  before  The 
mentioned.  The  unconscious  innocence  with  which  Sacnfice- 
they  wandered  to  and  fro  amongst  the  bystanders,  and  the  sim¬ 
plicity  in  aspect  and  manner  of  the  young  men  who  tended  them, 
more  recalled  a  pastoral  scene  in  Arcadia,  or  one  of  those  inim¬ 
itable  patriarchal  tableaux  represented  in  the  Ammergau  Mys¬ 
tery,  than  a  religious  ceremonial.  The  sun,  meanwhile,  which 
hitherto  had  burnished  up  the  Mediterranean  in  the  distance, 
now  sank  very  nearly  to  the  farthest  western  ridge  overhanging 
the  plain  of  Sharon.  The  recitation  became  more  vehement. 
The  Priest  turned  about,  facing  his  brethren,  and  the  whole 
history  of  the  Exodus  from  the  beginning  of  the  Plagues  of 
Egypt  was  rapidly,  almost  furiously,  chanted.  The  sheep,  still 
innocently  playful,  were  driven  more  closely  together.  The 
setting  sun  now  touched  the  ridge.  The  youths2  burst  into  a 
wild  murmur  of  their  own,  drew  forth  their  long  bright  knives, 
and  brandished  them  aloft.  In  a  moment,  the  sheep  were  thrown 
on  their  backs,  and  the  flashing  knives  rapidly  drawn  across 
their  throats.  Then  a  few  convulsive  but  silent  struggles,  — 
“  as  a  sheep  —  dumb  —  that  openeth  not  his  mouth,”  —  and  the 
six  forms  lay  lifeless  on  the  ground,  the  blood  streaming  from 
them  ;  the  one  only  Jewish  Sacrifice  lingering  in  the  world.  In 
the  blood  the  young  men  dipped  their  fingers,  and  a  small  spot 
was  marked  on  the  foreheads  and  noses  of  the  children.  A  few 
years  ago,  the  red  stain  was  placed  on  all.  But  this  had  now 
dwindled  away  into  the  present  practice,  preserved,  we  were  told, 
as  a  relic  or  emblem  of  the  whole.  Then,  as  if  in  congratula¬ 
tion  at  the  completion  of  the  ceremony,  they  all  kissed  each 
other,  in  the  Oriental  fashion,  on  each  side  of  the  head. 

The  next  process  was  that  of  the  fleecing3  and  roasting  of 
the  slaughtered  animals,  for  which  the  ancient  Temple  furnished 


1  Seven  sheep  is  the  usual  number. — 
Domestic  Life  in  Palestine ,  250. 

2  “  The  whole  assembly  shall  kill  it 1  be- 
‘  tween  the  two  evenings’”  (Ex.  xii.  6). 
*'■  Thou  shalt  sacrifice  the  Passover  at 

“  evening,  at  the  going  down  of  the  sun  ” 
(Deut.  xvi.  6). 


3  In  the  ancient  Jewish  ritual  the  lambs 
were  skinned,  as  in  western  countries  (2 
Chron.  xxxv.  11;  Mishna.  Pesachim .  ch. 
v.  9).  The  process,  as  above  described, 
was  like  that  of  our  mode  of  taking  off 
the  hair  from  pigs  after  they  have  been 
killed. 


71 


562 


THE  SAMARITAN  PASSOVER. 


App.  IIL 


such  ample  provisions.  Two  holes  on  the  mountain-side  had 
been  dug,  one  at  some  distance,  of  considerable  depth,  the  other, 
close  to  the  scene  of  the  Sacrifice,  comparatively  shallow.  In 
this  latter  cavity,  after  a  short  prayer,  a  fire  was  kindled,  out  of 
a  mass  of  dry  heath,  juniper,  and  briers,  such  as  furnish  the 
materials  for  the  conflagration  in  Jotham’s  Parable,  delivered 
not  far  from  this  very  spot.  Over  the  fire  were  placed  two 
caldrons  full  of  water.  Whilst  the  water  boiled,  the  congre¬ 
gation  again  stood  round,  and  (as  if  for  economy  of  time)  con¬ 
tinued  the  recitation  of  the  Book  of  Exodus,  and  bitter  herbs 
were  handed  round  wrapped  in  a  strip  of  unleavened  bread : 
“  with  unleavened  bread  and  with  bitter  herbs  shall  they  eat 
“it.”1  Then  was  chanted  another  short  prayer.  After  which 
the  six  youths  again  appeared,  poured  the  boiling  water  over 
the  sheep,  and  plucked  off  their  fleeces.  The  right  forelegs  of 
the  sheep,  with  the  entrails,2  were  thrown  aside  and  burnt.  The 
liver  was  carefully  put  back.  Long  poles  were  brought,  on 
which  the  animals  were  spitted  ;  near  the  bottom  of  each  pole 
was  a  transverse  peg  or  stick,  to  prevent  the  body  from  slipping 
off.  As  no  part  of  the  body  is  transfixed  by  this  cross-stake  — 
as,  indeed,  the  body  hardly  impinges  on  it  at  all  —  there  is  at 
present  but  a  very  slight  resemblance  to  a  crucifixion.  But  it 
is  possible  that  in  earlier  times  the  legs  of  the  animal  may  have 
been  more  directly  attached  to  the  transverse  beam.  So  at  least 
the  Jewish  rite  is  described  by  Justin  Martyr,  —  “  The  Paschal 
“  Lamb,  that  is  to  be  roasted,  is  roasted  in  a  form  like  to  that 
“  of  the  Cross.  For  one  spit  is  thrust  through  the  animal  from 
“  head  to  tail,  and  another  through  its  breast,  to  which  its  fore- 
“  feet  are  attached.”  3  He  naturally  saw  in  it  a  likeness  of  the 
Crucifixion.  But  his  remark,  under  any  view,  is  interesting  ; 
first,  because,  being  a  native  of  Nablus,  he  probably  drew  his 
notices  of  the  Passover  from  this  very  celebration  ;  which,  as  it 
would  thus  appear,  has,  even  in  this  minute  particular,  been  but 
very  slightly  modified  since  he  saw  it  in  the  second  century  ; 
and,  also,  because,  as  he  draws  no  distinction  between  this  rite 
and  that  of  the  Jews  in  general,  it  confirms  the  probability  that 


1  Ex.  xii.  8. 

8  Dial,  cum  Tryph.  c.  40. 


2  The  right  shoulder  and  the  ham¬ 
strings  ( Domestic  Life  in  Palestine ,  2501 

% 


App.  III. 


THE  SAMARITAN  PASSOVER. 


563 


the  Samaritan  Passover  is  on  the  whole  a  faithful  representation 
of  the  Jewish.  That  the  spit  was  run  right  through  the  body 
of  the  animal  in  the  Jewish  ritual,  and  was  of  wood,  as  in  the 
Samaritan,  is  clear  from  the  account  in  the  Mishna.1 

The  sheep  were  then  carried  to  the  other  hole  already  men¬ 
tioned,  which  was  constructed  in  the  form  of  the  The 
usual  oven  ( tannur )  of  Arab  villages,  —  a  deep  circular  roastms- 
pit  sunk  in  the  earth,  with  a  fire  kindled  at  the  bottom.  Into 
this  the  sheep  were  thrust  down  (it  is  said,  but  this  I  could  not 
see),  with  care,  to  prevent  the  bodies  from  impinging  on  the  sides, 
and  so  being  roasted  by  anything  but  the  fire.2  A  hurdle 
was  then  put  over  the  mouth  of  the  pit,  well  covered  with  wet 
earth,  so  as  to  seal  up  the  oven  till  the  roasting  was  completed. 
“  They  shall  eat  the  flesh  in  that  night  roast  with  fire.  Eat 
“  not  of  it  raw,  nor  sodden  at  all  with  water,  but  roast  with 
“  fire.”  3 

The  ceremonial  up  to  this  time  occupied  about  two  hours.  It 
was  now  quite  dark,  and  the  greater  part  of  the  community  and 
of  our  company  retired  to  rest.  Five  hours  or  more  elapsed  in 
silence,  and  it  was  not  till  after  midnight  that  the  announcement 
was  made,  that  the  feast  was  about  to  begin.  The  Paschal  moon 
was  still  bright  and  high  in  the  heavens.  The  whole  male  com¬ 
munity  was  gathered  round  the  mouth  of  the  oven,  and  with  re¬ 
luctance  allowed  the  intrusion  of  any  stranger  to  a  close  inspec¬ 
tion  ;  a  reluctance  which  was  kept  up  during  the  whole  of  this 
part  of  the  transaction,  and  contrasted  with  the  freedom  with 
which  we  had  been  allowed  to  take  part  in  the  earlier  stages  of 
the  ceremony.  It  seemed  as  if  the  rigid  exclusiveness  of  the 
ancient  Paschal  ordinance  here  came  into  play,  —  “A  foreigner 
“  shall  not  eat  thereof ;  no  uncircumcised  person  shall  eat 
“  thereof.”  4 

Suddenly  the  covering  of  the  hole  was  torn  off,  and  up  rose 
into  the  still  moonlit  sky  a  vast  column  of  smoke  and  steam  ; 

1  Pesackim ,  ch.  vi.  7.  It  was  to  be  Whether  the  spits  on  Gerizim  were  of 
wood,  not  iron,  in  order  that  the  roasting  pomegranate  I  did  not  observe, 
might  be  entirely  “  by  fire,”  and  not  by  2  Mishna,  Pesachim ,  vi.  7. 
the  hot  iron;  and  the  wood  was  to  be  3  Ex.  xii.  8,  9. 

pomegranate,  as  not  emitting  any  water,  *  Ex.  xii.  45,  48. 

and  so  not  interfering  with  the  roasting. 


564 


THE  SAMARITAN  PASSOVER. 


App.  III. 


recalling,  with  a  shock  of  surprise,  that,  even  by  an  accidental 
coincidence,  Reginald  Heber  should  have  so  well  caught  this 
striking  feature  of  so  remote  and  unknown  a  ritual, — 

“  Smokes  on  Gerizim’s  Mount,  Samaria’s  sacrifice.” 

Out  of  the  pit  were  dragged,  successively,  the  six  sheep,  on  their 
long  spits,  black  from  the  oven.  The  outlines  of  their  heads, 
their  ears,  their  legs,  were  still  visible,  —  “  his  head  with  his  legs, 
“  and  with  the  inward  parts  thereof.”  1  They  were  hoisted  aloft 
and  then  thrown  on  large  square  brown  mats,  previously  pre¬ 
pared  for  their  reception,  on  which  we  were  carefully  prevented 
from  treading,  as  also  from  touching  even  the  extremities  of  the 
spits.  The  bodies  thus  wrapt  in  the  mats  were  hurried  down  to 
the  trench  where  the  sacrifice  had  taken  place,  and  laid  out  upon 
them  in  a  line  between  two  files  of  the  Samaritans.  Those  who 
had  before  been  dressed  in  white  robes  still  retained  them,  with 
the  addition  now,  of  shoes  on  their  feet  and  staves  in  their  hands, 
and  ropes  round  their  waists,  —  “  Thus  shall  ye  eat  it ;  with 
u  your  loins  girded,  your  shoes  on  your  feet,  your  staff  in  your 
“  hand.”  2  The  recitation  of  prayers  or  of  the  Pentateuch  re¬ 
commenced,  and  continued,  till  it  suddenly  terminated  in  their 
all  sitting  down  on  their  haunches,  after  the  Arab  fashion  at 
meals,  and  beginning  to  eat.  This,  too,  is  a  deviation  from  the 
practice  of  only  a  few  years  since,  when  they  retained  the  Mosaic 
ritual  of  standing  whilst  they  ate.  The  actual  feast  was  con¬ 
ducted  in  rapid  silence  as  of  men  in  hunger,  as  no  doubt  most  of 
them  were,  and  so  as  soon  to  consume  every  portion  of  the  black¬ 
ened  masses,  which  they  tore  away  piecemeal  with  their  fingers, 
—  “  Ye  shall  eat  in  haste.”3  There  was  a  general  merriment, 
as  of  a  hearty  and  welcome  meal.  In  ten  minutes  all  was  gone 
but  a  few  remnants.  To  the  Priest  and  to  the  women,  who,  all 
but  two  (probably  his  two  wives),  remained  in  the  tents,  sepa¬ 
rate  morsels  were  carried  round.  The  remnants  were  gathered 
into  the  mats,  and  put  on  a  wooden  grate  or  hurdle  over  the  hole 
where  the  water  had  been  originally  boiled ;  the  fire  was  again 
lit,  and  a  huge  bonfire  was  kindled.  By  its  blaze,  and  by  can- 

1  Ex.  xii.  9.  I  had  heard  described,  I  was  unable  to 

2  Ibid.  11.  recognize. 

3  Ibid.  11.  The  hasty  snatching  which 


App.  III. 


THE  SAMARITAN  PASSOYER. 


565 


dies  lighted  for  the  purpose,  the  ground  was  searched  in  every 
direction,  as  for  the  consecrated  particles  of  sacramental  ele¬ 
ments  ;  and  these  fragments  of  the  flesh  and  bone  were  thrown 
upon  the  burning  mass.  “  Ye  shall  let  nothing  remain  until  the 
“  morning ;  and  that  which  remaineth  until  the  morning  ye  shall 
“  burn  with  fire.”  “  There  shall  not  anything  of  the  flesh  which 
“  thou  sacrificest  the  first  day  at  even  remain  all  night  until  the 
“  morning.”  “  Thou  shalt  not  carry  forth  aught  of  the  flesh 
“  abroad  out  of  the  house.”  1  The  flames  blazed  up  once  more, 
and  then  gradually  sank  away.  Perhaps  in  another  century  the 
fire  on  Mount  Gerizim  will  be  the  only  relic  left  of  this  most 
interesting  and  ancient  rite.  By  the  early  morning  the  whole 
community  had  descended  from  the  mountain,  and  occupied 
their  usual  habitations  in  the  town.  “  Thou  shalt  turn  in  the 
“  morning,  and  go  unto  thy  tents.”2 

With  us  it  was  the  morning  of  Palm  Sunday,  and  it  was 
curious  to  reflect  by  what  a  long  gradation  of  centuries  the  sim¬ 
ple  ritual  of  the  English  Church  —  celebrated  then,  from  the 
necessity  of  the  case,  with  more  than  its  ordinary  simplicity  — 
had  grown  up  out  of  the  wild,  pastoral,  barbarian,  yet  still  in¬ 
structive,  commemoration,  which  we  had  just  witnessed,  of  the 
escape  of  the  sons  of  Israel  from  the  yoke  of  the  Egyptian  King. 

1  Ex.  xii.  10,  46 ;  Deut.  xvi.  4.  2  Deut.  xvi.  7. 


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NOTE  ON  LECTURE  VL 


Nearly  the  whole  of  this  work  was  in  substance  written,  and  a 
large  portion  of  it  printed,  before  the  spring  of  1862,  when  it  was 
suddenly  interrupted  by  the  unexpected  suspension  of  my  Professorial 
duties,  consequent  on  my  journey  to  the  East.  It  is  thus  altogether 
irrespective  of  any  of  the  works  which  have  been  recently  published 
on  the  criticism  and  the  history  of  the  Old  Testament ;  and  it  would 
have  been  beside  the  purpose  of  the  work,  as  laid  down  in  the  Preface, 
to  engage  in  any  personal  controversy  or  detailed  investigation  arising 
out  of  the  topics  which  may  have  been  there  discussed.  It  may,  how¬ 
ever,  be  due  to  the  interest  excited  by  one  of  the  works  to  which  I 
allude,  to  state  in  a  very  few  words  its  bearing  on  the  subject  of  the 
present  volume. 

The  arithmetical  errors  which  have  been  pointed  out  (with  greater 
force  and  in  greater  detail  than  heretofore,  but  not  for  the  first  time,  by 
eminent  divines  and  scholars)  in  the  narrative  of  the  Old  Testament 
are  unquestionably  inconsistent  with  the  popular  hypothesis  of  the  uni¬ 
form  and  undeviating  accuracy  of  the  Biblical  history,  or  with  the 
ascription  of  the  whole  Pentateuch  to  a  contemporaneous  author.  But, 
on  the  other  hand,  the  recognition  of  these  errors  would  remove  at  one 
stroke  some  of  the  main  difficulties  of  the  Mosaic  narrative.  By  such 
a  reduction  of  the  numbers  as  Laborde,  for  example,  or  Kennicott  pro¬ 
pose,1  many  of  the  perplexities  2  in  the  story  of  the  Exodus  at  once  dis¬ 
appear,  and  the  incredibility  of  one  part  of  the  narrative  thus  becomes 
a  direct  argument  in  favor  of  the  probability  of  the  rest.  And  the 
parallel  instance  of  a  like  tendency  to  the  amplification  of  numbers  in 
Josephus’s  “  Wars  of  the  Jews”  is  a  decisive  proof  of  the  compatibility 
of  such  amplifications,  not,  indeed,  with  an  exact  or  literal,  but  with  a 
substantially  historical,  narrative,  of  the  series  of  events  in  which  these 
errors  are  embedded.  No  doubt,  to  those  who  regard  the  least  error 
in  the  Sacred  History  as  fatal  to  the  credibility  and  value  of  the  whole 
of  the  Bible,  and  to  the  Christian  Faith  itself,  such  discoveries  are  full 
of  alarm.  But,  if  we  extend  to  the  narrative  of  the  different  parts  of 

1  See  Lecture  V.  p.  137,  and  Lecture  XVII.  p.  423.  2  See  Lecture  VI. 


568 


NOTE. 


the  Old  Testament  the  same  laws  of  criticism  which  we  apply  to  other 
histories,  especially  to  Oriental  histories,  its  very  errors  and  defects  may 
be  reckoned  amongst  its  safeguards,  and  at  any  rate  aye  guides  to  the 
true  apprehension  of  its  meaning  and  its  intention.  From  an  honest 
inquiry,  such  as  that  which  has  suggested  these  remarks,  and  from  a 
calm  discussion  of  the  points  which  it  raises,  the  cause  of  Religion  has 
everything  to  gain  and  nothing  to  lose. 


INDEX 


♦ 


AAR 

Aaron,  his  relation  to  Moses,  127, 
168. 

- his  death,  222. 

Abimelech,  385-390. 

Abdon,  392,  414. 

Abraham,  his  burial,  37,  529. 

- his  call,  14. 

- his  migration,  5. 

- his  “  place  ”  at  Damascus,  532. 

- his  tomb  at  Hebron,  544. 

- his  wanderings,  29. 

-  legends  respecting  him,  14,  19, 

24. 

Achsah,  293. 

Ai,  fall  of,  263. 

Alexander  Severus’  worship  of  Abra¬ 
ham,  23. 

Amalek,  156,  354. 

Aphek,  battle  of,  420. 

Ark,  183. 

Arnold  quoted,  283. 

Asher,  297,  355. 

Ass,  use  of  the,  104. 

Avenger  of  blood,  191. 

\ 

B 

Baal,  324. 

Baal-berith,  324. 

Balaam,  209,  217. 

Barak,  353. 

Bashan,  237. 

Beer,  388. 

Beer-elim,  208. 

Beersheba,  38. 

Benjamin,  295,  333. 

Bethel,  Abraham’s  halting-place,  34. 

- conquest  of,  290. 

- Jacob’s  sanctuary,  64. 

Beth-horon,  battle  of,  266. 

Birzeh,  532. 

Burckhardt,  180. 

Byron  quoted,  399. 


ELI 

C 

Oaleb,  290. 

Canaan,  Canaanite,  same  as  Phoenician, 
234. 

- extermination  of,  278. 

- migration  of,  307. 

- relations  to  Abraham,  43. 

Carlyle  quoted,  282. 

Chrysostom’s  opinion  on  the  massacre 
of  the  Canaanites,  279. 

Circumcision,  26,  233,  258. 

Conquest  of  Palestine,  225. 

- of  Eastern  Palestine,  234. 

- of  Western  Palestine,  255. 

Controversy,  33,  244,  327. 


D 

Dagon,  402,  423. 

Damascus,  Abraham’s  connection  with, 
10,  532. 

Dan,  the  town,  290,  320,  331. 

- the  tribe,  290,  297,  355. 

Daniel,  470. 

Debir,  293. 

Deborah,  352,  354,  365,  366. 

- oak  of,  78. 


E 

JEbenezer,  battle  of,  434. 
Edom,  character  of,  60,  73. 
Edrei,  battle  of,  238. 
Egypt,  Abraham  in,  44. 

- Israel  in,  89. 

- Jacob  in,  80. 

- Joseph  in,  84. 

- Moses  in,  116. 

- plagues  of,  130. 

Ehud,  348. 

Eli,  414,  421. 


72 


570 


INDEX. 


ELO 

Elohim,  use  of  the  name  for  God,  24. 

- for  the  judges,  429. 

Ephraim,  294,  425. 

Esau,  character  of,  58. 

- history  of,  78. 

- his  tomb,  545. 

Etham,  189. 


F 

Faith,  justified  by,  20. 
Future  life,  173. 


G 

Gad,  242. 

Galileo,  276. 

Gerizim,  53,  310,  386,  560. 
Geshurites,  306. 

Gibeah,  333. 

Gibeon,  league  with,  264,  307. 

- siege  of,  267. 

Gideon,  his  call,  377. 

- his  family,  376. 

- his  royal  state,  384. 

Gilead,  68. 

Gilgal,  258. 


H 

Haran,  9,  530. 

Hazor,  287. 

“  Hebrew,”  the  name,  10. 
Hebron,  36,  79,  291,  535,  538. 
Heliopolis,  94. 

Hophni  and  Phinehas,  346, 418. 
Hur,  148,  186. 


I 

IcHABOD,  422. 

Ibzan,  392. 

Isaac,  offering  of,  56. 

- his  character,  41,  545. 

- his  tomb,  545. 

Isaiah,  469. 

Ishmael,  40. 

Issachar,  297. 


J 

J abesh-Gilead,  335. 
Jabin,  287. 

Jacob,  character  of,  58. 

- his  charge,  68. 

- his  death,  81. 


MAC 

Jacob,  his  tomb,  546. 

- his  wanderings,  63. 

Jael,  361. 

Jahaz,  battle  of,  236. 

Jair,  239,  392. 

Jasher,  book  of,  271. 

Jebus,  305,  333. 

Jehovah,  name  of,  122. 
Jephthah,  341. 

Jeremiah,  470. 

Jericho,  259. 

Jethro,  159. 

Jews,  61. 

- name  of,  290. 

Job,  book  of,  74. 

John  the  Baptist,  472. 

- the  Evangelist,  473. 

Jonathan  the  Levite,  328. 
Jordan,  passage  of,  255. 
Joseph  in  Egypt,  84. 

- his  tomb,  310,  547. 

Josephus,  xxxvii. 

Joshua,  his  character,  251. 

- his  prayer,  270. 

- his  decrees,  303. 

- his  death,  311. 

- his  first  appearance,  157. 

- name  of,  254. 

Jotham,  342,  386. 

Judah,  290,  348,  355. 

Judges,  book  of,  316. 

- name  of,  322,  429. 

- office  of,  322. 


K 

Kadesh,  202. 

Kadesh-Napthali,  352. 

Keble  quoted,  107,  163,  214,  252,  301. 
Kenites,  158,  361. 

Kepler,  277. 

Khudr,  El,  205,  252. 

Kings,  rise  of,  in  Israel,  224. 

- worship  of,  17,  99. 


L 

Law,  the,  179,  192. 

Leah,  her  tomb,  546. 
Leprosy,  104. 

Levi,  188,  298. 

Levites,  328,  331. 

Lot,  34. 

M 

Maacah,  306. 

Macaulay  quoted,  153,  225. 


INDEX. 


571 


MAC 

Machpelali,  36,  82,  635. 

Mahanaim,  69. 

Mahaneh-Dan,  408. 

Makkedah,  cave  of,  271. 

Mamre,  35,  535. 

Manasseh,  Eastern,  243. 

- Western,  295. 

Manna,  162. 

Marah,  152. 

Megiddo,  306,  358. 

Melchizedek,  48. 

Merom,  battle  of,  288. 

Meroz,  366. 

Mesopotamia,  6,  66. 

Micah,  327. 

Middle  Ages,  343. 

Midian,  236,  374,  379,  382. 

Milman,  Dean,  114. 

Milton,  234,  410,  412. 

Mill,  John  Stuart,  485. 

Miriam,  death  of,  203. 

- song  of,  146. 

Moab,  31,  348. 

Moses,  birth  and  education,  116. 

- call,  120. 

- character  and  appearance,  125. 

- death,  223. 

- family,  128. 

- grandson,  332. 

- importance,  150. 

- legends,  116,  205,  222. 

- mission,  171,  464. 

- name  of,  117. 

- psalm,  220. 

- songs,  219. 

- Strabo’s  account  of,  114. 

Muller,  Professor,  on  Abraham,  16,  24. 
- on  Revelation,  439. 


N 

Naphtali,  297. 
Nazarites,  345. 
Nobah,  240,  245,  290. 

O 

Og,  239. 

On,  95. 

Orfa,  528. 

Oreb,  382. 

Othniel,  293,  348. 


P 

Palestine,  inhabitants  of,  29,  230. 

- conquest  of,  230,  235,  250,  299. 

- name  of,  403. 


SAM 

Passover,  133,  559. 

Paul,  S.,  473. 

Peniel,  71. 

Pharaoh,  101. 

Philistines,  origin  and  character,  400, 
402. 

- fortresses,  305. 

Phinehas  I.,  245,  251,  311,  334,  414. 
Phinehas  II.,  418,  421. 

Phoenicians,  232,  324. 

Pisgah,  209,  213,  220. 

Plagues  of  Egypt,  130. 

Predestination,  15. 

Predictive  Prophecy,  458,  513. 

Priest,  42,  49,  182. 

Prophetic  office,  122,  171,  176. 
Prophets,  schools  of,  440. 

- catalogues  of,  488-490. 

- order  of,  teaching  in  the  present, 

495. 

- in  the  past,  493. 

- in  the  future,  511. 

- the  word,  457.  a 


R 

Rachel,  grave  of,  78. 

Rahab,  263. 

Ramah,  435,  454. 

Rameses  II.,  99. 

Rameses,  the  city,  138. 

Rebekah,  her  character,  41. 

- her  tomb,  545. 

Redemption,  142. 

Red  Sea,  passage  of,  139. 
Rephidim,  156. 

Reuben,  242. 

Revelation  to  Abraham,  15. 

- to  Moses,  122,  168,  169. 

- to  Samuel,  438. 

“  Revelation,”  meaning  of,  438. 
Robson,  letter  from  Mr.,  530,  533. 
Rock,  the,  161,  219. 

Rosen,  Dr.,  542. 

Ruth,  336. 

S 

Sabbath,  197. 

Sacrifice,  186. 

- of  Isaac,  51. 

- of  Jephthah’s  daughter,  395. 

- Paschal,  561. 

Samaritan  Passover,  133,  559. 
Samson,  his  birth,  403. 

- his  character,  405. 

- his  death,  409. 

- his  history,  320,  406. 

- his  name,  405. 


572 


INDEX. 


SAM 

Samson  Agonistes,  412. 
Samuel,  his  birth,  432. 

- his  death  and  grave,  453. 

- his  judgeship,  434. 

- his  mission,  444. 

- his  name,  432. 

- his  prayers,  436,  449. 

- his  revelations,  438. 

Shamgar,  321. 

Shechem,  Abimelech,  389. 

- Abraham  at,  32. 

- Jacob,  75. 

- Joshua,  309. 

Shepherd  kings,  91. 
Shibboleth,  394. 

Shiloh,  309,  326. 

- the  sanctuary,  308,  421 

- fall  of,  424. 

Shittim  wood,  184. 

Sihon,  26. 

Simeon,  296. 

Sinai,  121,  165. 

Sisera,  356,  361. 

Sodom,  31-46. 

Succoth  in  Palestine,  76. 

- Egypt,  138. 

Sun,  worship  of,  16,  96. 


T 

Taanach,  306,  357. 
Taanath,  309. 


ZUL 

Tabernacle,  185. 
Tabernacles,  Feast  of,  300. 
Tabor,  321,  355,  376. 
Taylor,  Jeremy,  24. 
Tennyson  quoted,  80. 

Ten  Commandments,  194. 
Teraphim,  328. 

Thebez,  391. 

Theocracy,  174, 429. 
Tribes,  181. 

— —  central,  295. 

- eastern,  241. 

- northern,  297. 

- southern,  294,  296. 


U 

Ur  of  the  Chaldees,  527. 


V 

V ows,  325. 


Z 

Zaanaim,  360. 

Zeba  and  Zalmunna,  374,  383. 
Zebulun,  297,  354. 

Zeeb,  374,  382. 

Zuleika,  83. 


THE  END. 


I 


CAMBRIDGE:  PRINTED  BY  H.  O.  HOUGHTON* 


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